From couch to half Ironman for Rotorua group Jogging the Powerpoles

Rotorua athletes Vicki Wheeler (left) and Kerris Browne are all smiles ahead of Ironman 70.3 Taupo. Photo / Supplied

Events such as the Ironman 70.3 Taupo often draw athletes from all walks of life, with different reasons for participating and a wide range of goals.

The perfect example of this is a group of Rotorua athletes who took part in the event at the weekend and belong to a group called Jogging the Powerpoles.

Kerris Browne started the group, which is organised through Facebook, eight years ago after discovering there was not a lot available for busy people who wanted to be more active.

"It's a community fitness group, primarily for beginners, aimed at getting people off the couch and doing events. It grew from me being a mum and not knowing how to start training for a marathon.

"No-one could answer me. You go to a coach and they want you six days a week, but hello you're a mum, you don't have six days a week. There are lots of mums and dads and grandparents who only have a couple of days a week and want to do it socially.

"It just started as a Facebook group which more and more people followed, there's now 1000 people on there who want to learn about going further or faster or losing weight or about nutrition," Browne said.

Seven members of the Rotorua group, who are part of a wider group training for a full Ironman, used the Taupo event as a training run.

"It was a good halfway measure of where we're at. There's 29 of us in the full Ironman training group, which is made of people from other groups in Rotorua, and 12 did the half."

Rotorua's Kerris Browne during one of two cycle segments of the Ironman 70.3 Taupo at the weekend. Photo / Supplied

She said the group had evolved to include running and biking throughout the years, which had resulted in some aiming for their first full Ironman.

"It's the first time we've used the half as a training exercise for the full Ironman and there were a few doing their first ever half.

"It was actually probably one of the best days, there was very little wind and the wind can really cause problems with the bike."

The event was minus the usual 1.8km swim due to the potentially toxic algae found in Lake Taupo last Thursday, so the modified race comprised a 3km run, 90km bike ride and 21km run.

"I would say the outcome of it was the people who weren't very good at swimming got really good results and people who were very good at swimming got poorer results. I've got a knee injury so I didn't really want to run more. It was never going to make everybody happy, but hey they made a safe option and I suppose the bike and the long run at the end were major portions of the training so I was quite happy we still used it as a training tool."

Browne said the feeling of crossing a finish line never got old and she got equally as much joy out of seeing other members of the group do the same.