Considered one of the toughest IRONMAN events on the global circuit, IRONMAN Lanzarote lived up to all expectations today, offering up heat and strong winds to go along with the 2,500 m of climbing on the bike course to maintain it’s reputation that “normal limits do not apply.”
Gossage patiently cruises to another win
It’s not as though Lucy Gossage is any stranger to winning IRONMAN titles. Last year she claimed the double in the UK, winning both IRONMAN UK and IRONMAN Wales. This year she came oh-so-close to winning again in South Aftrica when she finished second in a three-way showdown that saw Simone Brandli get the win just ahead of Gossage and Jodie Swallow. All three were within two minutes of each other at the finish line.
Gossage had just finished her PhD before the race in South Africa and has decided to take some time off of both work and her studies to focus on her triathlon career. That’s scary news for her competition and the new-found ability to focus just on sport was justified today with her impressive victory.
While there are those who will argue that Gossage didn’t have to overcome a stellar field here today, no one will be able to argue with the impressive way she controlled the race. After coming out of the water in third place, 33-seconds behind last year’s top age grouper in Kona, Stefanie Adam, Gossage patiently started the bike course. Rather than try to race the other women, she focused on the numbers she was seeing on her power meter. Adam pulled away from the rest of the women, but was eventually caught by Germany’s Susan Blatt towards the end of the challenging bike course that features two mountain climbs along with some of the fiercest winds you’ll experience in IRONMAN racing.
Gossage came off the bike in third, just over three minutes behind Blatt and Adam, and gradually began to move towards the front of the race. Adam would fade to sixth, but Blatt hung tough through the first half of the run. By 24 km, though, the result seemed decided – Blatt was working hard, while Gossage was joking with the crowd one second ahead.
Gossage still didn’t push the pace, though, until 10 km to go, at which time she increased her tempo enough to ensure no one would come close to catching her. Blatt hung on for the runner-up spot, while another Brit, Corinne Abraham, ran her way to the third spot on the podium. Last year’s champion, Kristin Möller (GER) was never a factor, but did manage to run her way to fourth, while Spain’s Saleta Castro stayed near the front all day long and finished in fifth.
Guillaume has the race of his life
The scoop on Romain Guillaume was that he could swim and bike amongst the world’s best, but he couldn’t run fast enough to be a major player in the world of IRONMAN racing. Well, that was the scoop until today. Just five weeks after starting to work with new coach Yves Cordier, Guillaume exhibited patience we didn’t know he had, not to mention an impressive bike and run split, to take his second IRONMAN title (he won in Mont-Tremblant in 2012).
Guillaume is tiny and lives in Nice, France, so it comes as no surprise that he can ride a bike up hills like a Tour de France climbing specialist. After coming out of the water with the lead group, Guillaume patiently waited for the mountain climbs on the course and moved away from the only man in the race who had stayed close to him to that point, Denmark’s Henrik Hyldelund. Pre-race favorite Ronnie Schildknecht is obviously not in great form and was never in the mix, while the other man many considered the person to watch, Bert Jammaer, appeared to be in a decent position to fight for the win when he came off the bike in third, seven minutes behind.
In years past that would have been a perfect position to be behind Guillaume, who was known to blast through the first 10 km of his marathons, then crash towards the end to run well over three hours. That wasn’t the case today, though – told to run 41 minutes (three minutes slower than his usual opening 10 km) by his new coach, he was almost bang on. Jammaer quickly moved into second place and got the gap down to four minutes, but then it was the Belgian who crashed at 25 km. By 32 km of the run Guillaume had a seven-minute lead, which grew to 10 minutes by 37 km. His 2:57 marathon split was more than enough to get the win. Jammaer suffered through the closing stages of the run and was passed by last year’s runner up, Spain’s Miguel Blanchart Tinto, who was thrilled to get another second-place finish here in Lanzarote. Joel Jameson hung tough for fourth, while Hyldelund had to settle with fifth after being near the front for so much of the day.
Once again Lanzarote proved why it is known for being such a tough day. As the day went on the winds picked up more and more, making it even more challenging for over 2,000 athletes (2,060 started) who joined the pros for the largest field in the event’s 24 year history.