By Keith Dunlap on SwimSwam
Tragedy struck this past weekend during the swimming portion of the Ironman Texas triathlon held in The Woodlands, just north of Houston.
Mara Flavia, a 38-year-old Brazilian influencer and triathlete, drowned during the event’s 2.4-mile swim. The drowning happened in Lake Woodlands near North Shore Park.
An investigation is currently ongoing.
According to a Facebook post from volunteer Shawn McDonald, that was shared by Ironman Texas, Flavia disappeared underwater shortly after the start of the swimming competition before her body was retrieved at around 9:30 a.m. local time.
The race started at 6:31 a.m. local time, and the Woodlands Fire Department told the Houston Chronicle that crews were notified around 7:30 a.m. about a possible missing swimmer.
“A group of younger volunteers in a kayak on the far side of the field were raising a flag, blowing a whistle, yelling for help,” McDonald said in the post. “Dozens of athletes were between us and them. I could see swimmers clinging to their kayak. I heard them say she went under. I had Mila hand me the paddle and I started calling out to the athletes around us to stop so I could cross. I made my way over in about 30 seconds. When I got there and asked what happened, they all said the same thing: She went under. Right here. Right below us. The panic and fear on their faces won’t leave me for a long time. The only athlete I remember seeing was an older gentleman, maybe in his 60s — hanging onto the side of the kayak, goggles removed, with the widest eyes I have ever seen. A thousand-yard stare. He had just watched someone disappear beneath him.”
McDonald added that he dove underwater and “felt her body with my foot,” came back to the surface to catch his breath, and went back down to try and retrieve the body.
“She was gone,” McDonald said. “I don’t know how to describe what that felt like. I tried again. And again. And again.”
Divers eventually came and retrieved the body. Flavia was pronounced dead on the shore.
“We are saddened to confirm the death of a race participant during the swim portion of today’s IRONMAN Texas triathlon,” Ironman Texas said in a statement. “We send our deepest sympathies to the family and friends of the athlete and will offer them our support as they go through this very difficult time. Our gratitude goes out to the first responders for their assistance.”
SwimSwam photographer Jack Spitser was in attendance and said the water was “gross” and not helping was that swimmers weren’t allowed to wear wetsuits, which made it harder to be buoyant.
Wetsuits aren’t allowed if the water temperature is above 76.1 degrees, and race officials reported the temperature was 77 degrees on race day.
Spiters said the water was “murky” and that “you couldn’t see more than a foot in front of you underwater.”
“So the visibility was basically nonexistent, which made it super difficult to search once she went under,” he said.
A fitness influencer with over 60,000 Instagram followers, Flavia was an experienced triathlete, having contested multiple Ironman and Ironman 70.3 events, including Ironman Texas in 2023 and the World Championships in Kona later that year.
She is the ninth person to have died during an Ironman-branded event in the last 12 months, all of which came during the swim.
A study conducted in 2017 by the Minneapolis Heart Institute Federation found that deaths and cardiac arrests struck 1.74 out of every 100,000 triathlon competitors, with a majority of the deaths occurring in the swim portion.
“During this portion of the race, the athletes likely experience an adrenaline surge as they enter the water and are competing in close proximity to other athletes, and in some cases with environmental conditions that are difficult to prepare for,” said Dr. Kevin Harris, the lead study author.
Other factors, such as cold water shock, dunking and the increased difficulty of identifying someone in the water who is in danger, can also pose problems for triathletes during the swim.
Because of the increased risks the swimming portion of triathlons can cause, more triathlon organizers have gone to staggered starts to reduce the number of swimmers in one particular area.
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