The Iron Icons Motivational Speakers will motivate, inspire, and challenge your audience to transform their dreams into personal victories. Kathleen McCartney and Julie Moss take you on a remarkable Ironman Triathlon journey, which not only transformed their lives, but also created an enduring framework for a 30-year Ironman success story.

Kathleen and Julie's valuable lessons teach you how to dig deep to overcome extreme challenges to cross your personal finish line and achieve your Ironman-sized goals, one step at a time.

Don't waste one more day hoping for something big to happen! Transform your dreams into a success story! The Iron Icons Motivational Speakers challenge you to take that first step today.

Meet The Icons

Kathleen McCartney
Kathleen McCartney, winner of the 1982 Ironman Triathlon World Championship, has conquered the event considered the most grueling single-day sporting event in the world. Today only the toughest and fittest triathletes qualify to be among 1900 athletes who head to the Big Island of Hawaii each year to compete in a 2.4 mile ocean swim, 112 mile bicycle ride, and a marathon, 26.2 miles. For many, the goal is simply to finish.

McCartney became the 1982 Ironman World Champion in a dramatic race captured and repeated again and again by ABC's Wide World of Sports as the iconic example of "the thrill of victory and the agony of defeat." McCartney unknowingly passed a crawling Julie Moss just yards from the finish line, a courageous, dramatic finish that inspired millions, brought Ironman to the attention of the world, and elevated the sport of triathlon.

In 2012, McCartney triumphantly returned to the event that she won 30 years earlier. Emboldened by the Ironman motto, "Anything is Possible," McCartney called upon Ironman to recharge her life after facing difficult personal challenges. Drawing on her personal strength, determination and tenacity, she set out to turn adversity into success.

As a celebration of the 30th Anniversary of the 1982 race, McCartney's vision for Ironman 2012 included racing with Moss, who joined McCartney on her journey to Kona. The former rivals have transformed from competitors to collaborators and are now friends, training partners and "Iron Icons" Motivational Speakers.

McCartney has been featured on ABC's Wide World of Sports including an interview with Jim McKay, NBC Sports, The Johnny Carson Show, ABC's Superstars, and ABC's 25th Anniversary Greatest Moments of Wide World of Sports. She has been featured in national publications including Outside, Runner's World, Triathlete and Lava magazines.

McCartney received the Competitor Magazine Triathlon Legend Award in 2001. Together, McCartney and Moss received the Triathlon Business International 2012 Ron Smith "Female Triathlete of the Year" award. McCartney has crossed the finish line at 9 Ironman World Championships and 1 Ironman Triathlon in Japan.

Julie Moss
Julie Moss is credited with putting the Ironman on the map. The Ironman, held in the idyllic town of Kona, on the Big Island of Hawaii, is the most grueling one-day sporting event in the world. It starts with a 2.4 mile ocean swim, followed by a 112 miles of cycling, and then finishes with a marathon, a 26.2 mile run. For most of the 1900 athletes that compete annually in the Ironman World Championships, crossing the finish line is a victory.

Moss' goal in 1982 was simply to finish the Ironman as part of her senior project in PE/ Kinesiology, a graduation requirement for Cal Poly San Luis Obispo. No one was more surprised than Moss herself that she led the women's race right up to her well-documented collapse. Moss fell and staggered back up to her feet three times like a punch-drunk fighter refusing to stay down for the count. On her fourth and final fall, Moss surrendered to the pavement and began crawling the final feet to the finish just as Kathleen McCartney ran by for the win.

On October 13, 2012, 30 years after their history-making debut on the Big Island, Moss and McCartney once again stood at the starting line in Kona. In 1982 they were strangers and oddly matched rivals, now they enjoy a strong bond as training and business collaborators in Iron Icons: Motivational Speakers.

Moss has been featured on ABC's Wide World of Sports including an interview with Jim McKay, NBC's Survival of the Fittest, ABC's Superstars, and ABC's 25th Anniversary Greatest Moments of Wide World of Sports. Moss has also been featured in national publications, Triathlete Magazine, Lava Magazine, Competitor Magazine, Self-Magazine, ESPN Magazine, Sports Illustrated and Triathlon Magazine. Moss has been a race announcer with TriCalifornia Events for the past decade and became a Certified Yoga Instructor through Core Power Yoga in 2012.

Moss co-authored a successful book on lifestyle fitness, Workouts for Working People, Random House 1999. Moss was inducted into the 1993 Ironman Hall of Fame, and received the Competitor Magazine 2001 Triathlon Legend Award. Together, Moss and McCartney received the Triathlon Business International 2012 Ron Smith "Female Triathlete of the Year" award. Moss was inducted into the USA Triathlon Hall Of Fame in 2013.