Status: 09.10.2022 03:02
The new Ironman World Champion comes from Norway and is called Gustav Iden. The triathlete wins in Hawaii with a new course record. Veteran Sebastian Kienle finished sixth in his farewell performance.
Gustav Iden has become Ironman World Champion with a splendid race. After swimming 3.8 kilometers, cycling 180 kilometers and a marathon, the Norwegian caught the surprise second-placed Sam Laidlow from France and won with a new course record of 7:40:24 hours. In doing so, he left top favorite and compatriot Kristian Blummenfelt behind, who finished third.
“It was so incredibly hard. The last few kilometers the island really tried to get me down,” said winner Iden. “It was really epic.”
The best German was Sebastian Kienle in sixth place, who once again set an exclamation mark with his last race in Hawaii. Former world champion Patrick Lange, like Florian Angert, was given a time penalty while cycling and was therefore no longer able to fight for the top positions.
Penalties for Lange and Angert
When swimming at the beginning of the most important triathlon event of the year, no preliminary decision was made. 19 athletes came out of the water together in a large group led by Angert and Laidlow. Lange, who was not in the group, also had a good starting position with a deficit of less than 1:30 minutes.
But on the bike course, the German hopes were stopped abruptly. Both Lange and Angert, who was well up front, broke the slipstream rules and had to go into the penalty box for five minutes. So both fell far behind, had to move in weaker groups and lost a lot of time. Things went much better for Kienle, who continuously caught up and started the marathon in eighth place.
Laidlow keeps it exciting until just before the end
However, the second discipline was dominated by someone else, namely the Frenchman Laidlow. The 23-year-old smashed the cycling record in Hawaii by more than four minutes and started the final marathon with a clear lead over the two Norwegian favorites Iden and Blummenfelt.
And if you thought that Laidlow had used up all his energy for this record, you were wrong. The youngster withstood the attacks of the Norwegians up to kilometer 35 before Iden finally caught him. Top favorite Blummenfelt, who had already won the rescheduled World Cup from 2021 in Utah in May, was no longer able to follow the pace of the eventual world champion. No wonder: In addition to the course record, Iden also improved the marathon record in Kona with 2:36:15 hours.
Long in the top ten
Behind him, Kienle also showed a great performance on the running track and finished sixth behind Iden, Laidlow, Blummenfelt, the surprisingly strong Australian Max Neumann and Joe Skipper from Great Britain. Patrick Lange’s performance was also noteworthy: the 2017 and 2018 world champion ran a top marathon and thus moved up to tenth place.
Source: sportschau.de