On June 13 of last year, the Ironman Boise 70.3 triathlon was held.

But it was discontinued for this year and instead, Ironman Coeur d’Alene, the full 140.6-mile competition, was pushed from late June to Aug. 21. Ironman added a half-Ironman, or Ironman 70.3, to the Coeur d’Alene docket and it was held this past Sunday. In case you missed it — I noticed a fairly lighter crowd than last year’s full Ironman — I highly suggest, if you can, to brave what could be a pretty warm or hot day to watch this year’s full-Ironman, which of course sees most of the professionals finish at roughly 2:30 p.m., versus a 70.3, where they finished a bit sooner than 10 a.m.

Keats McGonigal, the Senior Regional Operations Director of Ironman, had a pretty valid explanation in a press release out of Tampa, Fla., last year as to why they pulled out of Boise and instead shifted their focus to the Lake City. Although the two events, according to Ironman officials, were not interconnected and the decision to allow the contract to expire in Boise was made independently of the races in Coeur d’Alene.

“Ironman wanted to move Ironman Coeur d’Alene to late August to get warmer water temperatures for the event,” McGonigal said. “When the city of Coeur d’Alene allowed this date change to happen, it created an opening for hosting Ironman 70.3 Coeur d’Alene in June.”

And it was an overall success, like it has been for each of the past 13 years the Ironman competition has been here.

“The Coeur d’Alene community has always been very supportive of our events,” McGonigal said. “Athletes recognize this support by registering so quickly that the event sold out. This community support continued this past weekend with the a very successful Ironman 70.3 Coeur d’Alene race. The athletes loved the community support. This is exactly why we wanted to bring the Ironman 70.3 race to Coeur d’Alene.”

THE FIRST local female to cross the finish line Sunday was Suzanne Endsley (5:14.36) of Hayden, who after 20 years of running triathlons and helping to bring the full Ironman race to Coeur d’Alene knows a thing or two about the differences between this area and Boise, having competed in Boise 70.3 in the past.

“Here you have these long, grinding hills,” Endsley said. “At Boise, the hills aren’t as long and enduring. I usually bike in Boise about a 2:36 (2 hours, 36 minutes) and here I did a 2:45 up here and I thought that was fast.”

One of the male runners who competed and finished was Jon Von Eschen, a 29-year-old First Interstate banker from Helena, Mont. He was 33rd out of 91 triathletes in his age division (5:54.07). Last year in Boise, he finished 12th out of 61 of his age-groupers (5:30.43) and a respectable 191st overall.

“It was a lot of fun,” Von Eschen said of competing in Coeur d’Alene. “I liked Coeur d’Alene a lot, there were good spectators and it’s a central location in the transition zone made it fun. The atmosphere is great, you can’t beat the weather today. Boise is a little more spread out; there are two different transition areas. The biggest thing is just the atmospehere and this is a great course.”

Bruce Bourquin is a sports writer at The Press. He can be reached at 664-8176, Ext. 2013, via e-mail at bbourquin@cdapress.com or via Twitter @bourq25