This Saturday, Wanaka is hosting the Challenge Wanaka Ironman. The town is flooded with 450 fit folk who want to run a marathon, swim 3.8 km and ride 180km down to Cromwell on the same day.

I can’t do one of these things, let alone all of them together. The local paper, The Messenger has been calling for volunteers saying they are a hundred people short as the event has doubled in size this year.

I put my name down and now have the heady responsibility of bag transition after the swim.  My job is to have the bags in order so the iron people can get out of the water, find their cycling gear and gear on their bikes. This may sound trivial but my new friend who is running the glasses stand next to me, where the iron people pick up their specs says the transistion can make or break the race for the pro athletes. I have a 5.00 am start so (hopefully) have plenty of time to get the bags in order.

Apparently 10% of Wanaka’s population are either competing or volunteering for the event. Lots of people will be out cheering. Hopefully the weather will hold, the prediction is rain but at least that will be better than the baking 35 degrees we had last year.