Triathlon Ireland says it told the organisers of the event in Youghal it could not sanction it going ahead because of the poor conditions.
Two men, 44-year-old Meath native Brendan Wall and 65-year-old Ivan Chittenden from Canada, died while taking part in the swimming section of the race on Sunday.
Post mortem's were carried out on their bodies yesterday to determine how each man died.
The national governing body for triathlons has confirmed that its officials did NOT give the go-ahead for the race after a safety assessment, due to the adverse conditions.
Sarah McGuinness Assistant news editor of the Business Post says this statement somewhat contradicts what event organisers have said:
"This does conflict with Iron Man's statement which had been issued before saying that its safety team had carried out standard checks and determined that the water was safe. It said that safety is of the utmost priority to the organization and that they demonstrated this in rescheduling the Ironman 70.3 event and that weather conditions were monitored carefully."