Nicole Feuerstein sits along the shoreline after competing in the Ironman World Championship in Kona, Hawaii. (Photo provided)

GREEN BAY, Wis. — Growing up visiting the Copper Country, Nicole Feuerstein developed a love of swimming, one third of a larger sport that encompasses swimming, running, and biking, the triathlon. That love helped get her interested in the triathlon, and led, this year, to a chance to compete in the Ironman World Championship in Kona, Hawaii.

But, having swimming, which is often the hardest leg for most competitors, was a boost.

“My family, both of my parents, are from the U.P., from Houghton, originally,” she said. “So I grew up, since the time I was born, swimming in Portage Lake. When I was in fourth grade, I started swimming and in rec leagues. When I’d come up in the summer, I’d even swim with U.P. Killer Whales when they still had a group at the high school pool. I ended up swimming through high school, I swam through college, and then I went to Michigan State, and I worked on my master’s degree there, and while I was there, I tried to pursue coaching and I found it really wasn’t for me.

“So, I was working with their swim team, when they still had a swim team at the time. Since then, their Division 1 swim team has been cut.”

So while swimming was in her blood, running wasn’t. Well, not directly anyway, but her father, that’s a different story.

“My dad also was a runner as I was growing up, and I never got into running, but I would get pulled along to his races,” she said. “After I stopped swimming through college, tried that coaching stint, figured out it wasn’t for me, I kind of lost track of fitness.”

Fortunately for her, she met a man who pushed her to get back into it, along with her friends, who were smart enough to push the right buttons.

“When I met my now husband, he was just starting to get into triathlons,” she said. “The entire time during this, I had friends that did them, and they were always like, ‘Nicole, you’d be so good. Like, swimming’s the hardest part for people. You have that down.’ And I was like, ‘Yeah, yeah. But I don’t know about, like, I know how to ride a bike, but I also don’t know how to ride like a road bike or even a triathlon bike.’

“When I met my husband, and he was starting to get into them, that was kind of what lit the spark a little bit. But even so, when I watched him through his first season, and I would go spectate, I thought it was cool what he was doing, but I was like, ‘I never want to do that.’ That still doesn’t seem fun to me.”

She did decide to learn how to properly ride a road bike, and things started to click for her.

“I did want to figure out how to ride, actually ride a bike, not just like a bike that you bop around the block, but like a bike where you have to clip into the pedals and all that jazz,” she said. “So, we got me a bike, and that was probably in the fall of 2019. We bought my road bike, and then I signed up to do my first triathlon shortly after that.”

Doing half marathons got her thinking about full ones.

“Of course, the pandemic hit. With the pandemic, I found that when I was at home, I was riding my bike on a trainer,” she said. “Typically, if you do a half Ironman, your bike is somewhere around three hours. So, when I was riding my bike at home during the pandemic, and I had sat on my bike inside for three hours, I was like, ‘You know what? If I can ride my bike inside for three hours, I can ride my bike outside for six,’ which is typically somewhere around what an Ironman bike is.

“So that was ultimately what changed my mind for me. So, I signed up for my first Ironman and 2021, and I’ve been hooked ever since. When I crossed that finish line, I did Ironman Wisconsin in 2021, and I literally crossed the finish line, and I said, ‘I want to do it again next year.'”

Living in Green Bay, there are no Ironman courses she can train on, but she can run, swim, and ride her bike in the area. However, Madison is not that far away, and she finds herself making trips down to practice on that course.

She was very excited to earn a chance to compete in Kona this year, but just before she was ready to head to Hawaii, tragedy struck close to home. She lost her uncle, Dave Strong, suddenly.

“I was really quite shocked,” she said. “I think that my uncle, my cousins, and my aunt, it obviously was very shocking for all of us to get that news. Dave was actually one of my godparents. He was one of my godfathers, and I have four (godparents). I have two godfathers and two godmothers.

“His funeral ended up being less than a week. It was five days, we left for Hawaii on the following Saturday. So, it was just like a whirlwind of a week of getting up there, attempting to grieve, while still being like mentally preparing for this trip. But, I was really grateful that I was able to get there, and had the opportunity to do that, before I left for 10 days to go to Hawaii.”

During the world championship, Feuerstein actually posted one of her slowest races of her career, and when she first finished, she was sure she never wanted to do it again, which made sense given everything she went through to get there.

“Doing the Ironman in Hawaii is something that, if you’ve never done an Ironman, but you’ve never done Kona, you’ve never done Ironman World Championship in Kona,” she said. “I don’t know. The level of exhaustion that I felt after that race, which was one of my slowest Ironmans I’ve done, I crossed the finish line, and I said, ‘I’m never doing this again.’ But, then I woke up the next morning and I was like, ‘You know what? Maybe in a couple years, I’ll try and give it a shot again,’ just because it didn’t go the way that I wanted to.

“While I was out on the course, there were quite a few moments that I started to tear up. It wasn’t tears of frustration, but it was more so moments of gratitude that I was able to be there, that I had the past year.”

Feuerstein was able to take stock of everything she had been through.

“I had a really hard year professionally,” she said. “I switched jobs, and so just to know that I had gotten through all those things, and the recent passing of my Uncle Dave, the moments that I teared up weren’t moments of frustration that the race wasn’t going the way that they were, but more so that I felt proud, and honored, that I was to even be there and have the opportunity to participate in that race. Because for many, that’s a bucket item that may never be. They may never get to.”

Now, looking back at her experience, Feuerstein wouldn’t trade a thing. She wants to get back on the proverbial horse and try again.

“I would love to,” she said. “I’m definitely going to do an Ironman again. I love Ironman Wisconsin’s course. Typically, you have to do like an Ironman one year, and then depending on when that race falls, it depends on which year you would qualify to race world championships, whether it would be that same year, depending on if you do an early.

“If you do an Ironman in April, you’re typically trying to qualify then for Ironman at the end of that calendar year, with where Wisconsin falls, because Wisconsin’s always the first weekend in September. That typically then qualifies you for the following, like the next calendar, year’s world championship cycle. So it really, I guess, for me, will depend on where I decide to race again, But I will do an Ironman again, and I will try to qualify for world championships again.”

Nicole Feuerstein poses by a sign promoting the Ironman World Championship in Kona, Hawaii. (Photo provided)