IRONMAN race director Adam Renn was huddled under the arch at the finish line trying to keep dry as the rain tumbled down and thunder rumbled out to sea on Thursday.
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But he still remained positive about the weekend forecast and scoffed at the possibility of "Armageddon" impacting Sunday's race.
"At the start of the week we were looking at Armageddon coming by the weekend and now the realistic forecast is something that's just going to be a little bit of rain," he said.
"A weather forecast is exactly that, it's just a forecast. It's never as bad as first predicted because they always work off what the worst-case scenario is."
While he didn't believe the 30th anniversary of the event would be marred by weather he assured alternative measures would be put in place to safeguard everyone involved if required.
That included the possibility of altering or cancelling legs.
"It's always a possibility, but it's the last option," Mr Renn said.
"We always want to stick with plan A and there has been instances at other Ironman events around the world where they've cancelled or changed or altered legs. At Ironman Melbourne a few years ago we did a half length swim in response to a three metre swell in Port Phillip Bay, but you're not likely to get a three metre swell up the Hastings River.
"The river usually stands up pretty well because it doesn't have the flow through issues some of the bigger rivers do to the north and to the south, so even with the amount of rain that's forecast we won't see a significant change in what the river's doing."
As a worst-case scenario the race director said if the swim leg was to be cancelled they would look at including another run leg "so we're not doing a mass bike start."
He understood the concern in the community after the widespread damage caused by a storm cell in Sydney, the Central Coast and the Hunter Valley last week.
"We will watch and monitor the weather closely and we've got a couple of plans up our sleeve and if we need to make some changes we will. The athletes, the volunteers and the general public are our main priority and we'd never put anyone in an unsafe position."
Mr Renn was confident Port Macquarie would escape the worst of the conditions and competitors, volunteers and the public would "just get a bit wet".
"We can all deal with that because it makes the hot shower at the end of the day that much better," he said.
"To think we'll end up with Armageddon on the weekend is a bit misguided and we'll do whatever we need to do to keep everybody safe. Don't worry about the weather because we can't control it; we deal with it and move on. Don't believe the hype."
