Ex-San Antonio anchor Sarah Lucero competes in Ironman

Following her departure from the TV world in 2017, Sarah Lucero has not slowed down. Since then, Lucero has been working on her fitness while sharing her journey on social media. On Saturday, October 14, the former news anchor reached a major milestone when she competed in the first-ever Ironman World Championship women-only race. She tells MySA competing in the World Championship in Kona has been a dream of hers since 2010.

“That year [2010] I completed two half-Ironman competitions, but then I got pregnant with my daughter so I had to drop out of my training for the very first Ironman Texas race in the Woodlands,” Lucero says. “I took a break from triathlons for nine years and finally realized my dream of completing a full Ironman in November 2019 in Cozumel. At that point, I still had a “one and done” attitude with those races. But soon after Ironman in Cozumel was over, I decided to sign up for another, and I began to wonder if I could one day qualify for the World Championship in Kona.”

It wouldn’t be long until she would qualify and begin her intense training which was more than your typical workout.

“The training ranges between nine and 14.5 hours a week. Nine hours for early in the season but it quickly jumps to 12 to 14.5 hours after a few weeks,” she shares. “Many days we do two work outs a day like a bike and a swim or a run and a swim. I usually do three runs a week (when I’m healthy), three swims and three to four bike sessions a week.”

Lucero says her trainer also adds in some strength and mobility work. However, the preparation doesn’t stop there. Lucero also follows a strict diet, which she says was hard to figure out at first. 

“When I started to train for Ironman races, I was still on a low carb, Keto style diet left over from when I was competing in bodybuilding. As training under my triathlon coach became more rigorous, I had to start incorporating carbs in order not to bonk on the workouts,” she tells MySA.

Lucero started working with an endurance specific nutritionist. She said her nutritionist helped her embrace eating to fuel her training, instead of under fueling before a long workout then overeating the wrong foods afterwards. 

Another piece of her training – sleep.

“Sleep is huge in endurance training. It’s an essential part of an athletes recovery and ability to perform well on the next day’s training sessions,” she says. 

The former anchorwoman says she aims for seven to eight hours of sleep and says quality sleep is important.  

“If you have a restless night of sleep, even if you were in bed for eight or nine hours, it doesn’t help in your recovery and you are still too tired to perform well the next day. I aim for a good amount of REM sleep and deep sleep,” she says. “I wear Garmin watch to bed usually so it tells me how much REM and deep sleep I got. Don’t ask me how it knows. It even tracks my heart rate when I’m sleeping, so if I can get into the lower to mid 40’s, that’s a sign of good sleep, too.”

During her training, Lucero did face one major roadblock. She fractured her ankle about five weeks into her training program. To this day, says says she never healed from the fracture and lost several weeks of training. 

“I hardly ran at all those last 12 weeks before the Ironman,” she says. “I also lost seven to eight weeks of training on the bicycle, when I had to scale back a ton and only ride on the indoor stationary set up. My swim was affected too. I could not kick much especially with my broken foot, if you can imagine.”

A week before the Ironman World Championship, she says her doctor ordered an x-ray, and when she met with him he shared devastating news. 

“He told me not to race in Kona. He highly discouraged it and warned me that I might do more serious damage and end up having to have surgery and perhaps pins put into my ankle. He said that recovery would take forever,” Lucero says. “At that point, my heart sank. I had everything invested into this race this entire year. I have been training for it as well as competing as an Ironman Foundation athlete, raising awareness and funds for the foundation’s charitable projects around the world.” 

Following the news from her doctor, Lucero says she decided to take the chance, even just walking the marathon if she needed.

On the day of the race, she says the anticipation kept her up. After only three hours of sleep, Lucero woke up at 4 a.m. to get everything ready, drink her coffee, water, and electrolytes.  

The competition consisted of swimming (2.4 miles), running (26.2 miles), and biking (113 miles) and started promptly at 6:25 a.m.

Finishing the swim course first, Lucero says her time was her slowest yet, finishing at an hour and 38 minutes. However, she says she wasn’t trying to set a new personal record with her fractured foot. 

“I did not finish as fast as I wanted to,” she says. “The swells in the ocean were stronger than I expected, and I had to keep redirecting myself to stay on course and not allow the waves to push me away from the wrapped. It was also a travel feast of swimmers. A few years ago, that would’ve made me nervous and freaked me out in the water, but, now I’m used to it. Even so, I was still surprised that some women even grabbed my legs to try to pull me backwards in the water.”

Lucero does say she had a better experience during the bicycle course. She was averaging over 18 miles an hour until they started to climb from 50 to 60 miles and her averages went down.

“I thought I could make up some time and pick up my speed on the way back after 60, however, the winds we were riding into on the way back had other things in mind. It was hard to recover my original speed, no matter how hard I pushed,” she says. “I finished the second half of the ride a bit slower but still not bad at all at 6 hours and 37 minutes.” 

The race wasn’t over yet. Lucero still had to complete her marathon. She says she started out eager, running four miles and feeling great. However, when she hit the hills that’s when things started to change. 

“I wanted to spare my ankle for the latter part of the marathons I did a lot of walk/running and it was mostly walking. It got dark on me by mile
17 or 18 and my head lamp went out, so I wasn’t able to run much anymore except for a few sections with a street lamp that threw some light down on the ground,” she says. “I was so afraid of tripping and twisting my ankle that I mostly walked the rest of the marathon except running down the finish line lane. I saved my ankle strength for that stretch and crossed the finish line a very happy camper after 15 hours and 51 minutes on the race course.” 

This was the latest at night she’d ever finished an Ironman, so afterward she headed back to her hotel with her husband. She says all she wanted was a hot bath and to get in bed, take an Advil, and try to sleep off the soreness she developed from walking more than she ever had in her life. 

While Lucero would love to say her next competition is coming up in a few months, she says she promised her family and herself to take some time off in order to take care of her body, bones, and regain some strength to help her prevent future injuries. 

“Last year, I found out through a Dexascan that I have Osteopenia after I broke my foot in early 2022. So this time around, with my ankle fracture, my doctor said he was not surprised I suffered a break considering the condition of my bones,” she says. “What I’ve learned is I need to seriously take my calcium and the vitamins and supplements that help my body heal and maintain where I am health wise. I’m doing that now and plan to get with my primary doctor or an endocrinologist to help me figure out how my hormones are doing. I’m not sure if there is more I need to be doing at this point to try to stay as active as I like to be.”

She says the moral of the story for women is this, “Don’t wait until you’re 50 to start taking calcium, vitamin D and the other supplements you need to stay healthy.” 

Lucero tells MySA she is considering going back to school to learn more about sports science and coaching different sports, especially women who want to do Ironman or even a 5K. Until then, you can follow Lucero’s life journey on social media.