An Ironman Who's Not Yet a Man

"Obviously he's a genetically gifted and genetically unique individual," Vigorito said of Lussi. "More importantly, he has parental support in great measure."

Joe Rogers, Lussi's swim coach for the past four years, also sees no danger for his student.

"If you can do, do it!" said Rogers, a coach with Georgetown Prep's swim team. "I know they've got a lot of silly rules out there trying to inhibit all these young kids from getting involved. But if you've got somebody like Hunter, who wants to do it -- and my God, does he want to do it! -- why stop him?"

Still, three-time Olympic triathlete Hunter Kemper says he couldn't imagine doing an Ironman-length event at 14. In fact, he has never raced the distance.

"What this kid is doing is amazing; It's very, very unique," said Kemper, 32. "But for sure I wouldn't recommend it. You hate to think you'll get parents around the country saying, 'I gotta get my kid out there!' " USA Triathlon defended the decision to let Lussi compete after documenting his swimming prowess and the safety precautions taken. (Craig Lussi, Hunter's father, raced alongside him and arranged for a physician to stand by.) But the organization discourages youngsters from entering full-length triathlons, promoting instead sharply scaled-down events tailored to the temperament and physiology of boys and girls from age 7 up -- races that last no more than an hour.

"There are many problems, in my opinion, with a 14-year-old doing a long distance like that," says Linda Cleveland of the USAT, who works with triathlon coaches. "He's still growing. Is he going to burn out in two years? While it's great he can do all the distances, we'd love to see him do safe distances for him now and do triathlons for the rest of his life."

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Hunter Lussi tried a kid's triathlon when he was 6. It consisted of a 500-yard swim, a 10-mile bike and a 2.5-mile run. And it didn't hold his interest long.

At 7, he set his sights higher after watching his parents compete in their first Ironman, at Lake Placid, N.Y. As Craig and Jeannette Lussi neared the finish, Hunter ran onto the course and grabbed their hands so they could cross the line as a family.

"From that day, that's what I wanted to do," Hunter Lussi recalled. "I wanted to become the youngest Ironman finisher."

Today, with his cherubic face and adolescent frame, the 14-year-old still stands out in a field of triathletes. There's simply no mistaking that he's a boy competing in an adult's world. That, he says, is a rush all its own.

"The expressions I get when people ask, 'Are you really13?' 'Are you really14?' make me laugh," he says. "It's cool."