The Ironman World Championship in Hawaii - ontoprise is sponsoring a local triathlete

ontoprise is proud to support Steffen Haak, a triathlete from Karlsruhe, in realising his dream to participate in the Ironman World Championship on 10th of October 2009 in Hawaii.

This contest is a tremendous physical and mental challenge for the athletes. Hans-Peter Schnurr, CEO of ontoprise, himself an active amateur runner knows the exertions: "Only those who show an exceptional amount of motivation and, above all, stamina, are able to pass this enormous challenge and be successful. There are also parallels to the economic world in which you also have to pass new challenges." One reason for supporting Steffen Haak is that ontoprise is regularly attending the local running event, called Baden-Marathon with 3 teams. "Sport brings people together and supports teamwork. This is why we are keen to support very good young athletes from our region" says Hans-Peter Schnurr.

To participate in the world's most famous triathlon, athletes have to qualify at selected races. Steffen Haak managed to qualify at the Ironman Switzerland with an excellent fourth place in the 25-29 age group.

To prepare for the extreme performance required at the Ironman competition, Steffen Haak is practicing several times a week in the pool, by bike or on his feet. Because of his work, as a graduate student, he has to fit his training during the week into an extended lunch or after work for about 2-3 hours, on weekends the training sessions are even longer.

A triathlon is a race combining swimming, cycling and running - with no breaks between the various disciplines. A "normal" triathlon at the Olympics consists of 1.5km swimming, 40km cycling and 10km running. The Ironman Triathlon World Championship in Hawaii, however, covers 3.86km swimming, 180km cycling and 42.195km running. This means that the athletes are on the road for more than 8 hours. Each discipline in this race is a challenge in itself. To illustrate: the 180km cycling corresponds to an average daily Tour de France stage and 42.195km of running represents a full marathon!

Steffen Haak was born in 1982 in Friedrichshafen, southern Germany. He began his industrial engineering studies in 2002, at the University of Karlsruhe (TH), where he soon discovered a passion for triathlon. In the triathlon group at the university he gets excellent training opportunities which have supported him to become one of Germany’s top amateur triathletes in his age group. Steffen Haak is currently working at the computer science research center (Forschungszentrum Informatik, FZI) on his dissertation in the field of Information Process Engineering.

For more information about Steffen Haak please visit: www.ontoprise.de/en/home/news/news-en/ontoprise-supports-local-triathlet/