Athletes are excited as they line up for the swim portion of the 2023 Ironman Lake Placid triathlon at the Mirror Lake beach. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

LAKE PLACID — After hosting a handful of Ironman Canada triathlons in the 1990s, Canadian Graham Fraser decided it was time to expand to the United States.

The 1985 Ironman World Championship finisher and his team had a list of places in the Northeast that they wanted to check out. But on their first stop, which happened to be Lake Placid, they fell in love and never went anywhere else.

It took less than a year of preparations, and Ironman Lake Placid was brought to life. The race is now the second-longest running Ironman in North America behind only the Ironman World Championship in Kailua-Kona, Hawaii. On Sunday, July 21, the Lake Placid event will mark its 25th running. Last year’s race would’ve been the 25th; however, the race was canceled in 2020 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

While Fraser hasn’t helped put on the event in 16 years, he isn’t shocked by its continuous popularity over the course. He always knew that it was a “special event in a special place.”

“With the sporting culture of Lake Placid, it’s just a sporting event that fit into the culture,” he said on July 15. “It is nice to reflect back and see that 25 years later it’s still going and filling up and popular.”

Spectators watch the start of the 2022 Ironman Lake Placid triathlon at Mirror Lake. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

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The first event

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When Fraser brought the idea to Lake Placid in 1998, everything seemed to work so quickly, including when the event was presented to the Lake Placid Village Board of Trustees.

“Five minutes into the presentation, Mayor (Jim) Strack stood up and said, ‘We’re doing this,'” Fraser remembered. “Then I said, ‘What?’ It didn’t take much, and then we just started planning.”

Triathletes work on their 2.4-mile swim during the 2023 Ironman Lake Placid race. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

To Fraser, Lake Placid had everything — a beautiful community with hotels and accommodations and a course.

“But it really comes down to the people,” he said. “At the end of the day, the community, the people I met when I came into town were welcoming. Very progressive thinking.”

That first event seemed to be well received by the community.

The first-ever Ironman Lake Placid triathlon had around 1,600 people compete in the race, including nine local athletes from Keene, Lake Placid, Saranac Lake and Wilmington. Lake Placid resident Brian Delaney, a co-owner of High Peaks Cyclery, had no idea what to expect the first time he competed in Ironman in 1999.

“It was a path that was unknown,” he said on July 15. “It was like a trailess peak.”

Alice Alberts raises the Ironman Lake Placid banner after crossing the finish line on the Olympic Speedskating Oval in 2023. (News photo — Arthur Maiorella)

Delaney continued competing in Ironman Lake Placid for 20 years following simply because it kept him fit.

“I didn’t ever want to do an event that I was going to struggle through, but I figured I was just going to keep the streak alive,” he said.

It’s been a few years since Delaney has competed in the Ironman, but he plans to return next year.

“I’ll be in the 70 age group,” he said. “Maybe I’ll even qualify for Kona next year.”

Delaney isn’t alone. More than 100 local participants have competed in Lake Placid’s Ironman triathlon.

Brian Delaney pedals through his hometown of Lake Placid during the 2013 Ironman race. (News photo — Lou Reuter)

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Changes

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In January 2009 and following the 10th Ironman Lake Placid, the World Triathlon Corporation, which owns the “Ironman” trademark, bought out Fraser’s North American Sports, which gave the Florida-based company ownership of all Ironman races worldwide, including the World Championship in Hawaii.

Fraser doesn’t like to say that he sold his company, because he didn’t want to lose his rights to any of his race. It was more of a take than a sale, he said.

Elizabeth Izzo of Lake Placid competes in the biking portion of the High Peaks Cyclery Mini-Triathlon series on June 24 in Lake Placid. (News photo — Parker O’Brien)

“When Ironman was sold to a private equity company out of New York, they said, ‘We’re going to buy you out and take over the races,'” he said.

In addition to Lake Placid, North American Sports also owned Ironman races in Idaho, Wisconsin, Florida and Arizona, as well as Ironman 70.3 distance events in California and Florida. Fraser continued to put on the Ironman Canada race in Penticton, British Columbia, but the damage was already done. He was devastated.

“It was like having your children disappear,” he said. “I was only 47, so I wasn’t prepared (for it). But life isn’t always as you plan. It’s just the way it is, and you’ve got to accept it.”

Fraser had been living in Lake Placid for nearly five years when his company was bought out. He loved it here, and still does. One of the biggest reasons he had moved to the Adirondacks was because his daughter, who was 10 at the time, asked him to while they looked upon Mirror Lake.

While Fraser still owns a house here, it’s more of a summer house now. He lives in in British Columbia, where he owns a junior hockey team. He also makes films and is working on an Ironman documentary.

Since his departure, the World Triathlon Corporation and the Ironman brand have been acquired by two different organizations. In the fall of 2015, a Chinese conglomerate Dalian Wanda Group acquired the WTC, and in 2020, Advance Publications, a privately held American media company, acquired the company and still owns it.

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Feels different

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Some have argued that the community involvement was more present in the early days of the Ironman race, when Fraser was still operating it, and now it seems to have a more corporate feel.

“It’s evolved in the United States from more of a down-home awesome to almost like a gigantic business through the last 25 years,” Delaney said.

Delaney, who has hosted the High Peaks Cyclery Mini-Triathlon race series for 40 years, said that event was a huge component with Ironman. Many of the athletes — along with Fraser — would take part in the race series leading up to Ironman Lake Placid.

Lake Placid Ironman triathlete Elizabeth Izzo reiterated that this once small town, locally owned race is nothing like it was in the early years.

“However, it’s still amazing,” she said on July 15. “The event in regards to the swim, bike and run community and being able to spend the day out with a whole bunch of people who have a similar mindset to you, with these big goals and they’re trying to make it to the finish line … That’s the same. I hope it never leaves.”

The 32-year-old remembers watching both her parents, William and Sandra, compete in the event, and it brings back some great memories. She has volunteered every year since its inception. In 2016, she decided to compete in the race alongside her father.

“I knew from my when I was a kid that I would do it some day. I just wasn’t sure when,” she said.

In her first time competing, Elizabeth qualified for the Ironman World Championship in Kona. She competed again in 2021 and landed another Kona slot. After her second time, her sister Anna took part. It’s become a family affair.

“I love the Ironman. It’s a town event, a community event, a national event and and international event,” she said. “I love racing, you basically get to do what you love with 2,000 friends.”

For Elizabeth, this race has a whole legacy that comes with it.

“For one of the original North American Ironmans to have come to Lake Placid back in the early days and has remained, I think it is one of the things that makes our village run the way it does and it’s what we’re known for next to the Olympics and in more modern times,” she said.

“It may have lost a little bit of its love and character, but it is a big event,” Delaney said. “It’s a big part of all of our lives and lifestyle. It was great, and still is.”

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Race director

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For Ironman Lake Placid Race Director Greg Borzilleri, this race awed him in 1999, and he continues to be an Ironfan, not just an Ironman employee.

“What pulls at my heart strings are the people at midnight and the fact that we have Mike Reilly coming back, who is the best announcer in the business and brings them all home,” he said on July 12. “You see the people, grown men and women, that actually break down in tears at the finish line. It kind of brings a lump to your throat. While this event might be a hassle for some of the people that live here, it means a lot to a lot of the people who participate in it. We make dreams come true, and that’s what probably brings me to it more than anything.”

In 1999, Borzilleri — a Lake Placid native — was working in sports development at the state Olympic Regional Development Authority. A year later, he and friend P.J. Rabice competed in the Ironman Lake Placid race.

“We watched it, and we were really impressed with it,” he said. “We decided to train together and race.”

Borzilleri competed in 2000, 2001 and 2002.

“My results were better than I thought they would be, but it was as painful as I thought it would be,” he told the News in 2000 after the race. He finished in 11:30:42. “It was inspirational to just watch it last year, but to participate was even better.”

After his first Ironman, Borzilleri said, “I’ll never do this again.” Then he did it again, vowed not to do it again and did it a third time.

“The third year I ended up in the med tent after the race,” he said. “I was puking my guts out at the finish line, and I’m like, ‘This will tell me for sure not to ever do it again.'”

In 2012, Borzilleri became the race director for Ironman Lake Placid. It takes months of preparation to organize and plan, feverish work during the week of the race and an entire day going non-stop from before sunrise to well after midnight on race day. He’s used a truck, bicycle and electric vehicles to get around the village during the race, and now he uses a scooter.

“I love bumming around town on a scooter,” he said. “It just gets me everywhere I need to go and pretty quick.”

Borzilleri said he’s glad to be back in the race director’s position, helping the community and the Ironman world celebrate this “iconic” event.

The biggest change he’s seen over the past 25 years was going from a mass start in 1999 to a rolling start in 2013.

“Competing in the mass start, I absolutely loved it because it was the rough and tumble part, and it was just a lot of fun,” he said. “And then for safety purposes, they went to a rolling start for all the events and they don’t have a mass start anymore.”

The next biggest change is that many Lake Placid residents and businesses now have what he calls “event fatigue” when it comes to Ironman.

“In the early days, the community really rallied around everything and it was great,” he said. “While Ironman kind of put Lake Placid on the map in the triathlon world, now that we’ve been coming so many years, it’s a little tougher to get everyone to welcome us. A majority of people, I think, still welcome it. And if they’re involved in the event at all, either as a volunteer or a spectator, they can see the actual joy and the absolute perseverance and effort that people put in.”

Borzilleri sees athletes put their hearts out for events such as Ironman, and they appreciate the support they get from the locals.

“It means a lot to a lot of people,” he said. “While it’s tough to deal with sometimes locally with the traffic and with sometimes some of the behavior, I think for the most part people are good. If you become involved in it, you can get yourself to the finish line at 10 o’clock or 11 o’clock at night and see the looks on some people’s faces when they accomplish something that they never thought they would accomplish, it means a lot.”

Borzilleri sees a parallel between Lake Placid hosting the Olympics in 1932 and 1980 and the Ironman Lake Placid triathlon.

“I think Lake Placid in its DNA is an event town,” he said. “From what I see, this is kind of the closest thing to the Olympics and the World University Games that we have on a consistent basis. The mass gathering of all these people, and everybody’s in one spot at the same time. For the lack of a better word, the swim start is our opening ceremony. … Then the finish line is our closing ceremony. …

“That’s what kind of brings me to it and makes it special for not only the competitors who are here, the volunteers who are here and the residents, it’s a big event. And big events, at least in my mind, are exciting.”

Borzilleri was also the race director for the Ironman 70.3 Lake Placid race, which was held from 2017 to 2019.

Ironman Lake Placid Race Director Greg Borzilleri, left, speaks with emcee Mike Reilly, middle, at the Mirror Lake beach during the 2019 race. (News photo — Andy Flynn)

Ironman rock on the shore of Mirror Lake marks the beginning of the Ironman Lake Placid triathlon, which was founded in 1999. (News photo — Andy Flynn)