Endurance
The IRONMAN 70.3 returned to Cebu in 2024 as IRONMAN 70.3 Lapu-Lapu — a 1.9 km ocean swim, 90 km bike and 21.1 km run beginning on the beaches of Mactan Newtown, in Budots Media's home city.
The course is a portrait of our island: swimmers in the same waters our drones film the outrigger canoes in, cyclists crossing the CCLEX bridge toward Cebu City and back, runners through Mactan's heritage streets past Lapu-Lapu's shrine. In 2024, 1,385 triathletes from 54 countries raced; South Africa's Henri Schoeman and the Netherlands' Els Visser took the pro titles.
For Lapu-Lapu City the race is more than sport — it is the annual proof that a Philippine island city can host a world-class endurance event, fill every resort on the island and put Mactan on screens worldwide. For Budots Media it is home turf: the endurance scene we document year-round, from paddlers to triathletes, races through our neighborhood.
Half the world's Ironman podium has now swum in the water outside our office.
Our relationship with the sport predates the 2024 race: in 2022 Budots Media produced Ironman-themed content for the Savoy Hotel Mactan with athletes Nevian Sanchez and Robert Tatii — a client project that put us in the water with the sport years before the world race returned to our coastline.
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