Lucy Charles-Barclay is one of the best female triathletes today, in this video we will tell
you all about her accomplishment in her career as a triathlete and her rise to the top of
the Triathlon leaderboards.
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Lucy Charles-Barclay was born on the 15th
of September 1993 , as a daughter to Mark and Elaine where she at a very young age learned to swim.
One of her first memories from her child hood is jumping into the deep end of a pool and
swimming to her parents who were at the other side of the pool.
Needless to say, Lucy Charles was a great swimmer from a young age and it is what she
dedicated her life to being as a teenager.
She won the county Swimming Champs in HertfordShire at the age of 9 and quickly moved her way
up the ladder to become a finalist in the 200m butterfly in Crystal palace in 2004.
However, she tragically failed to qualify to the swimming Olympics after being beating
by Keri-Anne Payne she was devastated because one month prior to the qualifying she had
actualy swum faster than Keri-Anne Payne.
And so,
she was left at a big crossroad in her life.
Continue her journey as a professional swimmer and qualify for the next Olympics, or quit
the sport and sports in general.
Lucy chose the third option of turning her attention to Ironman Triathlons, a sport where
her swimming background came in very handy.
With renewed energy and even hungrier than ever before Lucy took to triathlons like a
duck to water and was the first from her age category to finish the 2015 Ironman World championship.
The Brit specialized in the full ironman and middle Distances and excelled and went on
to win the Ironman Lanzarote in May 2017 and the Challenge Family Championship.
Lucy is also one of the most popular and marketable triathletes in the world, having a YouTube
channel with 70k subscribers, a dedicated site and being very active on social media.
It was not a big surprise when she got more and more sponsors such as the Energy-drink
giants of Red bull, who have made a name for themselves being a brand that likes to support
the most eye-catching athletes.
Lucy is often seen wearing a Red bull-branded cap headcap or bike helmet.
Speaking of sponsors, her signature color is pink, as her bike sponsor gave her a pink
bike to race with.
Ever since the color pink has been synonymous with Lucy, she is also sponsored by Roka and
Endura which are praised high among triathletes for their quality products.
Her most impressive feat was when she finished a swim in only 48:29 and finished second behind
Sarah Crowley, which started to give her more and more attention.
At the 2017 Ironman World Championship, she finished second place once again behind the
dominant four-time world champion Daniela Ryf.
But Lucy got back to her winning ways when she won her second Ironman race in South Africa
in 2017.
2018 was a big year for multiple reasons, she had been together with her coach for quite
some time now however in December Reece and Lucy got married, they are quite discreet
about their private life so we don’t know for how long they had been seeing each other
we do know that they meet in 2011, while training with Hatfield elite swim squad.
They now live in Hatfield where Reece who is a four-time world champion in Ironman Triathlon
coaches not only his wife Lucy but also other athletes to become triathletes.
But 2018 was also a big year performance wise as she set a new personal best with 8:56:10
in the African ironman Championship beating her previous record with 4 minutes.
Daniela Ryf once again was too strong for Lucy in 2018 but Lucy managed to break the
swim split time record with 16 seconds, her overall time was the second-best time ever
ran but was once again shy of a first-place finish.
In 2019 however all conditions were right, all the hard work that she had put in finally
came together in the European Ironman Championships where she broke the world records with 5 minutes to spare.
In 2021 she continued to show her dominance over the rest of the field when she won the
Ironman 70.3 World Championship, she beat the nearest competitor being 8 minutes faster
clearly putting a statement to the world that there was no doubt who the best female triathlete there is.
Unlike many other Triathletes Lucy qualified as an open water swimmer compared to most
others who lack pure swimming pace to be the best of the best.
Other athletes lacked a history in swimming to compete with Lucy, this is why
Lucy Charles-Barclay is a true one-of-a-kind athlete.
To portray her kind of dominance in not only swimming but also in Cycling and running is
simply incredible.
Now you might ask what the next big accomplishment could be for a woman who has already achieved
everything, in may Lucy will once again participate in the St. George Ironman World championship
where she will be able to defend her Title, and in October the long-awaited World championship
in Kona, Hawaii will be held.
Lucy is also part of an elite group of Triathletes to attempt the sub7sub8 challenge.
For those who don't who what that is, in the sub7sub8 challenge male triathletes will attempt
to complete a full ironman Triathlon within the 7-hour mark.
For females and for Lucy the time to beat will be 8 hours.
Even though the date and location has not yet been revealed we do know what athletes
will attempt this challenge.
Alistair Brownlee, Kristian Blummenfelt, Nicola Spirig and Lucy Charles Barkley are the for
to attempt this challenge which has often been considered to be impossible.
However working harder than ever before with the perfect team providing the optimal gear
and nutrition, all 4 are sure that the sub7sub8 triathlon is within reach.
Impossible has never been a word Lucy believed in and after such a dominant performance in
St. George, Lucy will be hungrier than ever before to prove once again.
That she can do the impossible.
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