Competitors took to the Savannah River, the open roads and the North Augusta Greeneway for the annual IRONMAN Augusta 70-3 Sept. 27, 2026.
The top three women’s finishers were Lydia Russell. Grace Alexander and Samantha Skold. In the men’s division, it was Jackson Laundry, Ari Klau and Nicholas Chase.
An earlier Augusta Good News’ story highlighted Evans’ resident, Don Belisle, 70, who took on the challenge despite not having a pancreas and spleen. Belisle made it through the 1.2 mile swim with no problems, but at the 32-mile mark of the bike ride, he experienced severe cramping and stiffening in his hamstrings and was unable to finish the race.
“I didn’t do it today, but I’ll do it another day,” he said in a Facebook video.
He plans on reviewing his performance to see what he can do to improve his chances of finishing in the future.
Volunteers take their positions along the Savannah River before dawn at the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.Swimmers make their way down the Savannah River during the first leg of the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Spectators watch the swimmers from the 13th street bridge at the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Spectators watch swimmers make their way down the Savannah River at the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Swimmers make their way down the Savannah River during the first leg of the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Spectators watch the swimmers from the 13th street bridge at the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Volunteers help swimmers out of their wetsuits at the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.Ironman competitors embark on the 56 mile bike portion of the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good NewsIronman competitors embark on the 56 mile bike portion of the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Ironman competitors embark on the 56 mile bike portion of the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.Ironman competitors embark on the 56 mile bike portion of the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.A competitor makes his way through the tunnel on the Greenway in North Augusta at the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.Click on advertisements for more information.Runners grab water along the way at the Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News. Runners make their way down the Greenway in North Augusta at the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.Runners make their way down the Greenway in North Augusta at the IRONMAN Augusta 70.3 Triathlon on Sept. 27, 2026. Mike Adams/Augusta Good News.
Mike Adams is a veteran photographer who has won multiple South Carolina and Georgia Press Association Awards in his career including nine in 2026 for Augusta Good News. During his career, he’s photographed for several news outlets including The Augusta Chronicle and the Aiken Standard.Sign up for the Augusta Good News weekly newsletter here.
Local stories on local people, organizations and events. That's the focus of Augusta Good News, a member of the Georgia Press Association. And you don't have to go through a paywall to find these stories. An independent voice in Augusta, Ga., Augusta Good News is not funded by a billionaire or a large corporation; it doesn't have celebrity reporters who have agents. It's local people who are invested in the community and want to tell its stories. You can support local journalism and help us expand our coverage by becoming a supporter. Through Ko-Fi, you can give once or set up a monthly gift.
By submitting this form you are consenting to receive emails from Augusta Good News. You can remove your consent to receive emails at any time by using the Unsubcribe link found at the bottom of every email. Emails are services by Constant Contact.
Something went wrong. Please check your entries and try again.
The cf_use_ob cookie informs Cloudflare to fetch the requested resource from the Always Online cache on the designated port. Applicable values are: 0, 80, and 443. The cf_ob_info and cf_use_ob cookies are persistent cookies that expire after 30 seconds.
session
__cfwaitingroom
The __cfwaitingroom cookie is only used to track visitors that access a waiting room enabled host and path combination for a zone. Visitors using a browser that does not accept cookies cannot visit the host and path combination while the waiting room is active.
session
cf_chl_rc_i
These cookies are for internal use which allows Cloudflare to identify production issues on clients.
session
cf_chl_rc_ni
These cookies are for internal use which allows Cloudflare to identify production issues on clients.
session
cf_chl_rc_m
These cookies are for internal use which allows Cloudflare to identify production issues on clients.
session
__cfruid
Used by the content network, Cloudflare, to identify trusted web traffic.
session
__cf_bm
Cloudflare's bot products identify and mitigate automated traffic to protect your site from bad bots. Cloudflare places the __cf_bm cookie on End User devices that access Customer sites that are protected by Bot Management or Bot Fight Mode. The __cf_bm cookie is necessary for the proper functioning of these bot solutions.
session
__cflb
When enabling session affinity with Cloudflare Load Balancer, Cloudflare sets a __cflb cookie with a unique value on the first response to the requesting client. Cloudflare routes future requests to the same origin, optimizing network resource usage. In the event of a failover, Cloudflare sets a new __cflb cookie to direct future requests to the failover pool.
session
_cfuvid
The _cfuvid cookie is only set when a site uses this option in a Rate Limiting Rule, and is only used to allow the Cloudflare WAF to distinguish individual users who share the same IP address.
session
cf_clearance
Whether a CAPTCHA or Javascript challenge has been solved.
session
__cfseq
Sequence rules uses cookies to track the order of requests a user has made and the time between requests and makes them available via Cloudflare Rules. This allows you to write rules that match valid or invalid sequences. The specific cookies used to validate sequences are called sequence cookies.
session
cf_ob_info
The cf_ob_info cookie provides information on: The HTTP Status Code returned by the origin web server. The Ray ID of the original failed request. The data center serving the traffic
session
These cookies are needed for adding comments on this website.
Name
Description
Duration
comment_author
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
comment_author_email
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
comment_author_url
Used to track the user across multiple sessions.
Session
Google reCAPTCHA helps protect websites from spam and abuse by verifying user interactions through challenges.
Name
Description
Duration
_GRECAPTCHA
Google reCAPTCHA sets a necessary cookie (_GRECAPTCHA) when executed for the purpose of providing its risk analysis.
179 days
WP Consent API is a plugin that standardizes the communication of accepted consent categories between plugins.
Name
Description
Duration
wp_consent_{category}
Stores your consent preference for a specific cookie category (e.g., functional, marketing). It ensures consistent consent management across WordPress plugins supporting the WP Consent API.
30 days
Statistics cookies collect information anonymously. This information helps us understand how visitors use our website.
Google Analytics is a powerful tool that tracks and analyzes website traffic for informed marketing decisions.
Contains information related to marketing campaigns of the user. These are shared with Google AdWords / Google Ads when the Google Ads and Google Analytics accounts are linked together.
90 days
__utma
ID used to identify users and sessions
2 years after last activity
__utmt
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests
10 minutes
__utmb
Used to distinguish new sessions and visits. This cookie is set when the GA.js javascript library is loaded and there is no existing __utmb cookie. The cookie is updated every time data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
30 minutes after last activity
__utmc
Used only with old Urchin versions of Google Analytics and not with GA.js. Was used to distinguish between new sessions and visits at the end of a session.
End of session (browser)
__utmz
Contains information about the traffic source or campaign that directed user to the website. The cookie is set when the GA.js javascript is loaded and updated when data is sent to the Google Anaytics server
6 months after last activity
__utmv
Contains custom information set by the web developer via the _setCustomVar method in Google Analytics. This cookie is updated every time new data is sent to the Google Analytics server.
2 years after last activity
__utmx
Used to determine whether a user is included in an A / B or Multivariate test.
18 months
_ga
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gali
Used by Google Analytics to determine which links on a page are being clicked
30 seconds
_ga_
ID used to identify users
2 years
_gid
ID used to identify users for 24 hours after last activity
24 hours
_gat
Used to monitor number of Google Analytics server requests when using Google Tag Manager
1 minute
Jetpack's built-in visitor analytics. It records page views, referring sites, search terms, and outbound link clicks, and also carries the shared visitor-tracking library used by Jetpack Instant Search and WooCommerce Analytics.
