MIDDLESEX TWP — Steve Cooper was racing against time — his own biological clock.

The 1989 Butler graduate and former basketball standout recently turned 39. A few years ago, he vowed he would compete in an Ironman race before turning 40.

Cooper competed in the recent Ford Ironman Louisville event in Kentucky that consisted of a 2.4-mile swim, a 112-mile bike ride and a 26.2-mile run.

He finished 1,995th out of 3,000 athletes from 20 countries. Cooper was 318th in his men's 35-to-39 age division.

None of that mattered. What mattered was that he finished. His time was 14 hours, 38 minutes.

"I've done maybe 20 triathlons and three marathons in my lifetime, but that was right around or shortly after my college years," Cooper said. "I hadn't done any running for 10 years or so.

"Doing an Ironman race was one of those things on my list. Three years ago, I figured I was running out of time. I felt like I had to do one before I turned 40," he added.

Cooper, who lives in Middlesex Township, spent the last three years training seriously for the Ironman. He concentrated on running during the first year, doing a marathon in Erie. The next year, he competed in a half Ironman triathlon in Michigan.

This past year, Cooper focused on his training. He swam three days a week from 5 to 7 a.m. He ran at 10 p.m. each night and spent four to eight hours on a bicycle two or three days a week.

"It was hard squeezing sleep time in there, but I tried to train during odd hours so I wouldn't mess with family time too much," Cooper said.

Now employed as a registered nurse at UPMC in Pittsburgh, Cooper has climbed Mount Rainier and Mount Everest, served as a forest fire ranger, taught on an Native American reservation in New Mexico, as well as hiked in Morocco, Africa and Australia.

"That man's been to a lot of places and done a lot of things," said his father, Jim Cooper. "He can't seem to stay in one place. I must have dropped him on his head when he was younger or something."

Cooper said he learned to take on challenges in life — physical or otherwise — from Mark Jula, his high school basketball coach at Butler.

"Coach Jula was a main inspiration for many of the adventures that I have completed," Cooper said. "He instilled a confidence and the drive that continues to motivate me to push myself."

Cooper played center on the 1988-89 Golden Tornado basketball team that set school records of 25 wins in a season and a 24-game winning streak.

Cooper averaged 13 points, eight rebounds and two blocked shots per game and played in the Dapper Dan Roundball Classic that season.

He also competed in track and field and cross country, doing the high jump, triple jump and long jump. Cooper said his eighth-grade basketball and track coach, Chuck Tompkins, introduced him to cross country and track.

"He's the one who got me running," Cooper said.

Now that the Ironman experience is over, Cooper plans to run in the Pittsburgh Marathon next spring — and that's it.

"No more after that," he said. "It takes too much time away from family."

Cooper and his wife, Marie, have children ages 7, 5 and 3.

Cooper is planning some challenges to tackle with his family.

"We're going to start working on the high points, that is, hiking to the high point of all 50 states," Cooper said. "We're starting off locally with Pennsylvania, Maryland, West Virginia and Delaware.

"We'll hit the more challenging states as the kids get older. I love to travel and I love having a goal in front of me. It keeps me motivated."