One of the toughest races, the Ironman involves a 1.9 km swim, a 90 km bicycle ride, and a 21.1 km run, all to be completed within 8 hours and 30 minutes. Naturally, it is an achievement to be proud of. Diya Nayar, has done this at 41 when she crossed the finish line with an impressive time of 8 hours and 8 minutes, proudly representing India in the 41-44 age category.
A runner, triathlete and a fitness enthusiast, sport is Nayar’s passion. A marketer by profession, she works with a global venture capital firm and lives in Mumbai with her husband. Her fitness journey started in 2007 when she moved to Singapore to do her MBA. “Singapore is a very outdoorsy country and I love the outdoors. With no money to join a fancy gym, I started running. Singapore has a huge running culture which helped because a lot of people are into fitness. My colleague at the time made me sign up for a JP Morgan Corporate Run, it was 5.6km in distance. With a goal in place, I started training in all earnestness. And the rest as they say is history,” she recollects.
After completing her first Olympic distance triathlon in 2022, Nayar wanted to challenge herself to see if she could complete an Ironman 70.3 race. “I think I have always been an adrenaline junkie, in search of my next adventure while trying to push myself towards an audacious goal,” she says.
However, training for an endurance sport like triathlon is never easy, especially when one has work and other commitments to juggle alongside it. “It is not easy but it is very much possible with a little planning and discipline. I have always been a planner, so charting a plan was easy. With the help of my coach, I had a training plan which I knew would get me to the start line. I have also always been a morning person; early mornings were never a problem,” she says. As all her training had to be done before she got into work, she woke up at around 4:00 am 5-6 days a week and got to work by 8-8:30 am, with enough energy to start the professional part of her day. “I am also lucky that my organisation allows the team to flex and plan their day which gave me the freedom to get in early and leave early,” she says.
What makes her journey particularly inspiring is that she learnt to cycle in 2020 and mastered long-distance swimming in 2022 and she admits that she was nervous. “I had never swum in the sea and cycling long distances was still something I was uncertain about. Nothing ever prepares you for race day, the training may be done but the true test lies in how you manage yourself, your time between the start and finish lines. And this race was no different. Pre-race nerves is something all athletes have learnt to accept and deal with. Waking up on race day, I was excited but also a nervous wreck because I knew the day was going to be long and being my first 70.3 race, I had no idea what to expect,” she admits.
While she had friends who were racing too, her husband being there was of great comfort to her. “In short it was a day of surprises, learning and trusting the training I had put in. It was an unexpected choppy swim, we experienced strong crosswinds during the bike leg and as was expected, the sun was beating down strongly through the three loop run course. But all the pain fades away once you see that finish line – I could not believe I had done it, what once seemed impossible was now a reality,” avers Nayar.
Inspired by Matt Fitzgerald’s book ‘How Bad Do You Want It?’, she likens her journey to a fire walk. ‘The outcome lies in your answer to the question – how bad do you want it?’ Her story is not just about completing a race but about embracing challenges, pushing limits, and proving that audacious goals are within reach for those who dare to dream. “In part, both my sister (Arti) and myself have been raised to never say ‘I can’t’ so I think that fire in belly was lit by my mother who never shied away from a challenge. I remember browsing through the Ironman website, and I stumbled across a race video. Watching that, I think I knew what I had to – the Ironman tagline is ‘Anything is Possible’. And for me, that was all the assurance I needed to take on the challenge,” she signs off.
