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Forgive me if this month\u2019s column seems even more incoherent than usual, but I\u2019ve just had a nasty shock!<\/strong><\/p> Recently I\u2019ve decided to come out of unintentional Ironman<\/a><\/strong> retirement and enter a race in 2024. Unintentional because I did my last IM pre-lockdown and haven\u2019t really got back into the full-distance swing. <\/p> However, after messing about with ultra-marathons<\/a><\/strong> and giant swims this year I decided it was high time I returned to where my heart is, namely staggering cramp-ridden along some path while caked in snot and flies with hands covered in sticky gel after swimming 3.8km and cycling 180km.<\/p> I was pondering which race upon which to relaunch my pale, bony and scar-tissued legs so began an online search. Should I return to the scene of my greatest triumph and fastest finish at Challenge Roth<\/a><\/strong>, where I was mistakenly assailed as a fellow-countryman by drunken Germans? <\/p> Or should it be Ironman France, where my closest family live and where I can wangle some cheap accommodation? Or perhaps it should be the land of my father, Ironman Wales<\/a><\/strong>, where I can learn Welsh for key phrases like \u2018Can I borrow your track pump\u2019 and \u2018Is this the way to the medical tent?\u2019<\/p> It was while scrolling through likely races, however, that I received my shock, because my eye fell on a news story that nearly made my fall off my turbo trainer \u2013 Ironman Lanzarote<\/a><\/strong> might not be going ahead\u2026. What?! The race of races, the king of Ironmans, not going ahead? How can this possibly be??<\/p> I have a love-hate relationship with Lanza. It\u2019s the only race I\u2019ve done three times and it\u2019s responsible for my three slowest times. I\u2019ve suffered like the proverbial dog on that hot, windy hellscape of a course, but something about it draws me back<\/p><\/blockquote> It seems that numbers of entrants have fallen to the point where, at the time of writing, the future of the race is in serious doubt. <\/p>The king of Ironmans<\/strong><\/h2>