The French Riviera sets the stage for a crucial chapter in our journey to Marbella.
For Olympic legend Greg Van Avermaet, it’s a test: new sport, new rules, same drive.
For our amateur triathlete Marnix, it’s everything — his final shot at qualifying for the Ironman 70.3 World Championship.
This episode blends high-stakes racing with world-class advice and raw behind-the-scenes moments:
🚴♂️ Pre-race recon & bike prep
💬 Candid talks with Fred & Marten
📈 Nutrition, pacing, and race-day plan
😂 Marnix being… Marnix
It’s not just a race. It’s a turning point.
Like, comment, and subscribe to follow the full “Road to Marbella 70.3” series.
Next up: running with John Heymans — and pushing everyone’s limits even further.
00:30 Bike Prep
06:22 Breakfast Talks – Race prep
10:22 Swim test
16:30 Transition bag advice
19:08 Bike Check-In
20:29 Breakfast of Champions – Race Day
21:37 Last Preps in transition zone before the Start
23:45 Start of the race
24:11 T1 – Out of the water
25:28 T2 – Jumping off the bikes
26:26 The Finish line with Fred & Marten
29:08 Race recap with Greg & Marnix
30:02 Podium & Roll-down ceremony
31:20 Wrap-Up & final thoughts
Oh, look. He’s even ready. I’m waiting for Greg to give him his medal. Hello, guys. Welcome to another video. You guessed it right. We’re in Nice for this one. So, we’re participating at a 70.3 in N. Me and Greg. Peter’s not here, but uh it’s the last chance to get my spot for my baya. So, let’s see what it brings. And Greg is just joining for fun and to win maybe. Nothing broken so far. I feel as long as I don’t need it’s okay. It’s already done. He’s already riding. But he has no air. So he always has to come here. So I have to take it easy. Yeah. We put a bigger ring in front. 56 cuz Marx Marx thinks that I’m going to go fast. Say it’s too small. 54 I think it’s a bit better. Yeah, especially in the descent. It’s a hilly course but on some points still quite fast I think. So then it’s good you know to pedal a bit and also just keep this the chain a little bit more straight maybe about the legs. Anyway, it’s a good practice for Marbella, you know, then we know if you have the right setup or not. And also for me, it’s quite important because I’m not used to this kind of stuff just to keep have a little bit of habits. I think it’s important take some confidence. It feels quite comfortable. Had a few trainings on it now. So, it’s feels a bit better than before. And then small changes like of course the chain ring and the handlebars probably also Marbella a bit of different wheels you know will be good. Yeah. In the good old days I had my mechanic to do all this stuff for me. I was just laying on my bed. I miss those days somehow. People take care of you. That’s one. Now the shifting next. Oh, probably I uh it’s not connected anymore, but that’s why Marx is here. It’s not for qualifying and just for helping me. So I will need them. You can see there are also some rules about how many water you can take the amount. So I’m really rookie. So we have to be careful that the things right. Still have to let check the rules also. I think I probably will be allowed you know to otherwise BMC probably will not put it there. I just wanted to check because I don’t carry too much of water especially in this kind of conditions that we’re going to have on Sunday. My mix will know. I have to ask him. And I also have to read the athletes guide which normally our team director always did and I just most of the time when I was a cyclist I just watch watch the parkour just to see and all those other things I really didn’t care about too much. I actually have a better tool for that. But we’re too lazy to take it. Okay. Shifting. That’s my next problem. What do we need next? Way. Voila. Perfect. Huh? All set. I even have a Monik brought me even a how you call swimsuit. Well, it’s too warm. We are not allowed to swim on a wet suit. I hope it’s not true because I’m not such a great swimmer and help the wets suit helps me a lot. So, but in case you know, he said it’s even a bit faster than a normal uh tree suit. The swimsuit tree, swimsuit, wet suit, we have everything in tr. I hope we can do it in a wet suit and we or as fast as possible out of the water and because we can start biking which probably will be still the best for me. Now we have to see what is doing. I have to check with him. We will bring in some air. Of course, he’s again in the master suite. So my my room is always small. And then you have those guys play. Oh, look. He’s even ready. I brought you somewhere else and I have a little problem. My uh my shifters. Look at this. Race ready. Hey, this guy. Yeah. First first question. Oh, how many water we are allowed to take with us? Yeah. Yeah. I think there is a there is a relayment. Yeah. It’s only in Germany. It’s only in Germany. German. Where is he? He knows everything. This guy. Ah, no. No, no, no, no, no, no. Bingo, bingo, bingo. Ah, somewhere. That’s okay because this one is shifting. You see it’s not me yet. Oh. Ah, yeah. Wait, wait, wait, wait. I clicked it well enough. Good, good, good. So, we are good. We can we can still start picking the hole. I was a bit stressed, but I could not start it. Voila. Fixed. How would you do without me? Not a lot. I always try to say the same to my wife, but she does not respond. Good. So what’s the plan today guys? So uh think we go for a swim short swim. We should we found out we cannot probably will not be swimming with a wet suit. So we have to try out our new swimsuit. Yeah. So we have a swim skin uh which is actually a a backup plan for a wet suit. doesn’t give us much buoyancy, but it’s a still a little bit faster than without anything. We’ll test that out and do a short swim and then I think we have a rest day for the big day tomorrow. Yeah, that’s the plan. It’s not so good news, I think, because we are both not great swimmers. So, we’re both okay. We are okay. We are not good. We’re not great. So, it’s it’s a bit it’s a bit disappointing that we have to leave our wet suit at home. Uh but uh we’ll be fine. Uh we just take it easy today. Feel how the sea feels and then rest day. Like you said, try to rest as much as possible because because yesterday we were quite busy walking around training. We’re also dropping the bikes today. So we need to bring them to to T1, so transition zone. And then we also need to hang the handy packs for transition zone. And then we also get the timing chip so we can uh start the race. And so today we’ll eat a lot of carbs. Carbup for tomorrow. No fibers. Yeah, we have we try to find a pasta place. You can ask two or three portions because the restaurant’s portions are a bit too too tiny for us. You also have to that’s for me always the hardest part like to put everything together the packing you have to pack. So you have to do already the race before the race in your head and that’s I don’t something I don’t like to do normally. So you have to think about what you going to eat what you going to drink put everything right in the right place found it back when you come out of the water. So it’s actually also busy a busy job to do that. But I think the most important like if I did Flanders or something or Ruba or even to the friend I was like just enjoying it like of course before and after you have a bit of stress it’s normal without stress you would have if you would be too relaxed at the start it would be also no fun but if you if you start the race and you see all the people and you have good legs that is true if you know you have good legs you really can enjoy it. Some guys forget I think to enjoy what they’re doing especially on that moments you know because it’s not normal if they say to to you for example you can write Flanders on Sunday they would say like oh it’s a dream to write Flanders you know that’s always like I try to approach I was like I can ride the tour to France was my dream to write the tour to France so it’s it’s already a goal that you made to be there just to be But first I got to put my uh race clothing. Yeah. First fish. Skin. Swim. Swim. Skin. Over. Skin. Swing. Swim. Swim. Skin. Swim. Swim. The water is cold. Eh. Look. So, we go. Oh, we go there. I’m not going to walk my naked race tree suit to in the to the niche proad because people going to say like, “Hey, this guy is naked. This guy has been in tiny in cold water. We walk there, swim, walk back faster. Let’s go. Let’s go. I focused myself already on the big building there cuz if you get out of the water, it’s a bit of a Yeah, I have to look at place where I have to put my bike and I get stressed. Really strange. So now I have to go to the toilet. Here we are. This is the swim start. So we’ll do a course reckon to see how the seat feels. The sun hits. I feel already bad because of the walking now. Typical with me. I’m not used to be in the sun when I’m not doing sports. I’m always in the shadow. There’s an exit. You zip me up, baby. See how the swim the swimsuit three suit, swimsuit, wet suit. They have everything in trouble. He wants to swim already and I say he has to wait cuz I’m swimming in my sweat. We are in in this together. So we have to do you have to wait for me. That’s that was part of the deal of doing this. So he cannot he cannot run away. Look at him. A little star. I’m so proud. What I would like to do just it doesn’t it didn’t wrote the small letters of the contract. So, uh right now we’re just standing still. It’s about the hour we’re running tomorrow. So, I’m standing still and the sweat is really dripping from my back, from my head in the sun. It’s at least 40, 50° maybe. It’s really warm here. But yeah, we love it. I just follow how we doing. We going to swim. It seems like yesterday was warmer. Good. Good. Way better than I expected because of the salt water. You’re really nice on top of the water. Really pushes you up. Better than expected. So that’s good. The going out is hard for me. Always you swim and then you have to run and then you’re a bit dizzy. the whole going that like that quite hard. Well, I just want to try to get some more because I think this will also cost energy, you know, to put it on. I’m more confident than this morning. cuz I wasn’t expecting the salt water to be that much better. It’s really not the same as in a swimming pool where my legs are just like flat. Here you can actually lay on the water really. A few moments later. One eternity later. Not going to be easy. I think I still have to practice in my uh in my hotel room. Took only 3 minutes. Yeah. Somehow you think it’s like quite flexible, but we have when you swim without it’s it’s better. But this is a decision that we have to make this afternoon. We took a lot of confidence this morning or next is not sure yet. We came more but here it’s allowed. Nobrook is a bit different to create a little bit the Marbella vibe. Probably we’ll see him also in the next episode. Here he feels normal again. I was I was calling Frederick and he said like of course I was asking some some stuff about the parking and the bike loop etc. But he also said like there’s a lot of people building their first item in on this heat. It’s not a good idea. All right. The last time I did it, I directly broke it when I started riding, but it was flapping the whole time. So annoying. You always have things to do and not too much resting. So, I skipped the running part. Morning it was running. But like it’s better to just take it easy. In case you’re wondering, I didn’t jump in the shower, but I’m uh completely soaked of half an hour of running. So, yeah, that was fun. I think uh all confidence we gained this morning because of the swim. Uh we need to be realistic and it’s going to be really warm in the run and um we might have to walk to cool down, but we’ll see. I’m going to grab something small to eat. Come back. See what Marx is doing. All right. So, uh, transition back preparing. So, for the swimming, I take two swim caps. So, one, uh, on my head, then the swimming goggles, then the Iron Man one. If you use just one or put your swimming goggles on top of your swimming cap, you might lose it or you lose it more quickly in the water. pre-race I will put some Vaseline in my neck because of the salt in the water you can shave a bit and then I will also spray my goggles with an anti-fog uh spray um to prevent fog of course pre-ways I also drink some beet juice some shots should help but no it really helps but it’s a ritual I think then the bike bag we have the helmet which I will put on now because we go to the bike checkin now race number bike shoes glasses for on the bike I won’t take the izer because it’s too warm. Then of course the Wahoo and then I have an ice pack here. I can just It’s an instant ice pack. So this is my dry suit. Has a little pocket here in the neck and then I can break it, put it in and then I I have I’m in my neck also to to battle the heat of course. Small towel just to dry myself off when I come out of the water. And then transition to the run. We have my running shoes. I’ve I’m not wearing socks, so I’ve already put some Vaseline in here. I’ve tested up front where I get blisters when running bare feet. So, I put some Vaseline here and here as well. Really helps preventing uh blisters. We have the omnous headband uh which also is a is a cooling effect here. So, if you put this one on in your forehead, gives some cooling, especially when you make it wet and then with the wind of the running special stones catch the wind, give some extra cooling. And then again a nice pack. Another one to switch it smaller one to put it in the in the neck again. And we say in Flemish. So it’s a Yeah. Uh to get in the shoes uh quickly. Oh yeah, and then I forgot uh we also bring the wet suit. Of course, chances are really low uh that it’s going to be a wet suit swim, but yeah, you never know. Maybe a miracle will happen and yeah, will be a boost in self-confidence again. So, we’ll bring that one as well and then we’ll see tomorrow morning what they say. Yeah, prepared already my transition uh setbacks which is always difficult. Just do not forget anything. I will double check afterwards. And now we’re going to drop off our our bike at the bike station. One, three. Oh, wow. Wow. Jeez. So, we’re removing some air cuz the sun is still shining uh quite hard. And of course, heated air expands, so um might cause the tire to explode. I I was checking his tires because he he left a lot of uh air. So, just wanted to be sure Let’s go. 4:29 in the morning. We’ll eat some crappy bread, some uh jam, frosties, bit of milk, and a small coffee. Not too much coffee because of course caffeine uh can put some uh me in the stomach. Some fast sugars, some easy digestible sugars. And then uh race day, but I’m still tired. I don’t know. This is open. I’m not open yet. What was the locks? Breakfast of champions. We’ll see you later. Yep. Think so. Ready to go. Toilet is calling. 26° of water temperature 30 mm wide. So 4 and a half will do because for and to your bike don’t know what I’m doing. I think I’m going to go to my uh running part and then the bike. It’s better to stay together. Where is he? All good. Bike check in. Running gear ready. So that was the most important part. So now we start racing. Let’s go swimming. Let’s go swimming. Greg is already pulling away. He’s already putting in the dear. I think he’s nervous as well. How do you feel? Stressed. Always a bit uh you’re not used to it. Just hope I didn’t forget anything. it. It’s going to happen hopefully. Thank you. Heat. Heat. Oh, drag. Come on. Huh? 2 next to everyone. Congratulations on your race. Yeah. Heat. Heat. Heat. Come on, guys. Go, go, go. Good, good, good. Hello. Now we go running in the sun. and extended up to celebrate a brand new champion. All right, go. Watch this. I need to do a base. You need to say good. 3.3 champion all the way to give him his medal. Yeah. Congrats. Congrats. SK was okay. Now it comes. Oh, with the heat and everything, it’s Oh, but I was okay. Not too bad. I always kept the tempo. It’s that’s the most important. No, you did great. Uh on the swim, of course, being not a swimmer, it’s not easy without wet suit in the sea. But then on the bike, obviously, uh he can use all of his skills. And then on the run, he did great. you know, uh, after the bike, uh, started 345 per kilometer, then ended up with 4 minutes, 4 minutes or 5 per kilometer. So, really impressive performance. He’s a five-time winner. So, I I called him yesterday for the last tips and uh it’s really helpful because he knows, you know, how it how it is. It’s it’s it’s different if you’ve been an athlete yourself. if you’ve been into it yourself, it’s uh it’s always uh it’s always a good advice that you can give because you’ve been there several times probably him and all those small tips, you know, he will also never say I’m running too slow. I know because they know that the runner always rides as fast as possible and those kind of tips is uh is great to have. Heat. Heat. That was warm. I p my run pretty good. How was it? All good. I was Yeah, I was pretty consistent on the run, so that was good. Yeah, I saw you a few times. I said he’s having a hard time, but you were quite I started I started really hard, but then I got through tempo. Yeah, but it was hot. Yeah, like the heat blocks you like you can’t push through. Yeah, I was also like scared like just keep my tempo. I just went faster and then just finish. The last time the airport I was like that was so hot there. the top left cuz you you’re running in the shadow but there was like no wind because of the shade. It’s also a long long stretch with no feet. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We did it. You won. Champagne. Yeah. Champagne. Champagne. I got to buy champagne tonight. Big bubble. You play a long time and I know you roll top three. Well done. Thank you, sir. That’s super cool. Well done. You had a good race today, mate. It was amazing to watch you race. We will roll to the next person until we find the winner of that spot. If I call your name and you say we, he will shake your hand. He will hand you a slot to my s. It will take forever. is over now. But it’s yes or no. We cannot change the man from One spot left. It’s good for the bank. Okay, so guys, so that was the video for today. Uh, hope you enjoyed it. Um Rick did because he won of course of course you enjoyed it. Ah yeah I enjoyed it. Yeah it was quite hard but yeah but a good result. Uh better than expected expected. So it was nice to be here. Uh good circumstances. quite hot but for me it was good preparation also for Marlla of course which will be probably a little bit colder but you know to have a little bit the rhythm and the transition zones was really important for me so I catch a little bit of more confidence which will be important because uh Marbella will be on a different level yeah different level not reachable for me unfortunately yeah it’s a bit of a pity actually you did a good race I think but yeah level is quite I it’s not easy and it should not be easy to qualify. Makes it a little bit like special, you know, when you go there, but uh try your best. Yeah. So, uh yeah, I’ll go to my with Rick to support him then. That was part of the deal of doing this. So, he cannot he cannot run away. We’re back in uh in Belgium now. Uh how do you feel? I’m okay. I’m okay. I’m a bit tired, but it’s okay. Uh I think the race went quite well to be honest. Um especially if you look at the the preparation time I had and becoming a dad for the second time in uh in April. So um yeah, think it was okay. I did a good performance for the time I could train and the sleep I had. So uh so yeah, overall I’m pretty happy with the performance. I got 28 out of my age group. So, uh, it’s a shame that I’m not qualified, but yeah, maybe it was not a not a very realistic goal at the end. Um, the 13th could go and then in my was a 20th, so yeah, we could have we could have got lucky, but uh, yeah, we didn’t. What will it take to to qualify? What will it take to qualify? I think if you can train like 15 15 20 hours for a half iron man um your base is bigger and you can can put in a lot of more work and then then I should be able to to qualify. I think it was like 10 minutes with the last one who qualified and that’s especially on the on the on the parkour like Nice which is quite quite hard. You could gain that and you could also like do some like heat adaptation training. We actually needed on the day itself because it was really hot. um and he can handle the heat better. You just your overall performance will be better. The level is crazy, right? The problem is that there’s no real amateurs anymore. So, everyone is training so hard and so so many hours like to just do an iron man, it doesn’t exist anymore. It’s it’s such a high level. I was also talking to Greg about it like especially also in in the gravel series like for example if you compare it with the with the gravel races UCI to be qualified for the world championships you have to be with the first 25%. So that’s also really really hard but then if you look at Iron Man the 13th could go and there were like 290 participants in my age group so that’s not even not even 5%. Um, so yeah, it’s just really hard to qualify and you have to be really on top of your game to to get there, which is also good because of course it’s a world championship and only the best can go. But yeah, so since I’m not qualified, but I still want to show you guys what it takes to become a world champion in Iron Man. So I’ll be joining Peter and Greg for the next trainings and episodes. Hope to see you next time. And uh please like and subscribe video and like and subscribe on our channel and comment if you have any questions for me or for Greg. Next video we go running with John Hammonds. He’s an Olympic participant as well. So we went to the Olympics last year in France. So he will teach us all about running and how to run fast. The best
1 Comment
congrats to you two 🎉