Hi All,
I have been planning on discussing some recent results in the triathlon world, but for whatever reason (too engrossed in the Giro? not enough top stars racing against each other?) I keep putting it off. Enough is enough...
The last bunch of races started with Ironman 70.3 Florida. Leanda Cave dominated the women's race, easily winning by several minutes. Two Canadians (Magali Tisseyre in 3rd and Lisa Bentley in 6th) finished near the top of the leaderboard. The men's race was a sprint finish between Dirk Bockel over Luke Bell. As you might have guessed, the pro fields were not real strong.
The next weekend, Ironman 70.3 Austria was held, and the frequent-racer Chris McCormack outsprinted Marino Vanhoenacker by 3 seconds for the win. The women's race was won by Sandra Wallenhorst over Lucie Zelenkova. Erika Csomor only managed to finish 5th...hmmm, that's not too great for the frequent 70.3 winner. I love that Macca has raced about 8 times already this year but we haven't seen anything from Normann Stadler, Faris Al-Sultan, or the rest of the top Europeans.
The Bayliss's (husband and wife) had another good day at Ironman Lanzarote last weekend. Bella easily won the women's race in 9:54, winning by over 21 minutes. She's amazingly consistent in Ironman races, but seems to be more interested in racking up wins rather than peaking for Kona like many of the top ladies. Her husband Stephen finished 5th in the men's race, but could not challenge Bert Jammaer as he repeated as men's winner. Two Ironman veterans who consistently race >5 Ironmans a year, Stephan Vuckovic and Olaf Sabatschus, finished second and third.
So we have had three decent Ironman or 70.3 races the past three weeks, but only 3 of the Top 10 finishers in Kona competed in any of those races (actually, they were all women - Wallenhorst, Bella Comerford-Bayliss, and Erika Csomor). Why don't the guys race more often? It's not the greatest sport to follow since it is pretty easy to go months without racing against other top athletes. Not very Bikey-friendly...
The ITU thought they figured out this by launching the World Championship Series. With well-spaced races around the globe and more prize money than ever before, the ITU thought they could at least get their top athletes to race head-to-head 8 times from May to September. Looked great on paper, but unfortunately, the nicely spaced out schedule does not include enough races to make global travel appealing. So after an event in South Korea that many of the Europeans chose to skip, this weekend's race in Madrid does not include many top athletes from Canada, the US, and Australia. Instead, they are staying home to continue training and will wait for the Series to come to Washington, DC on June 21. So we will be into at least the third race of the year before we see Emma Snowsill racing against Vanessa Fernandes or to see Javier Gomez race against the three men that knocked him off the podium in Beijing. Grrr.
In Madrid this weekend we do get to see the first race of the season for Javier Gomez, but he is coming off a foot injury that he says has impacted his run fitness. Since he wins by hammering the run, it will be interesting to see what happens on Sunday. Olympic Gold Medallist Jan Frodeno is also starting his season in Madrid. He has never won an ITU race, but will have to beat Brad Kahlefeldt, Tim Don, Courtney Atkinson and Canadian Brent McMahon to do it. McMahon didn't have a great race in Korea, but as Canada's only racer in Madrid, I'm hoping he can pull out a Top 5 result in Madrid. The women's race is missing Snowsill, the Canadian girls, and even Vanessa Fernandes is sitting out due to her broken collarbone, so it good be anyone's race. Perhaps Juri Ide will win again? Or Annabel Luxford? Or one of the many British athletes? I can't even guess...
One last triathlon note that I found this weekend is that triathlons may be hazardous to your health. Yep, participating in a triathlon is twice as dangerous as running a marathon, at least according to this recent study. They found that among almost 1 million athletes in triathlons, there were 14 deaths. However, 13 of the 14 were during the swim leg (ummm, that doesn't make us poor swimmers feel any better) but most of them were due to suspected heart rhythm problems that only really showed up during the adrenaline-fueled swim leg. I would like to add that the chances of dying while driving to a triathlon are probably much higher than the risk of dying during one, but if your ticker hasn't been checked lately, it might not be a bad idea for some of the elder triathletes out there.
Okay, the Giro. I won't spend too much time on it this week, instead I will wrap it up on Monday next week after I know who will win the race. This week has featured an amazing head-to-head competition between Denis Menchov (current leader by 29 seconds) and Danilo Diluca (currently second and the overwhelming local fave). I doubt they have been separated by more than a few feet all week long. During the mountain top finishes, they watch each other, counter every move, and look to add or subtract every second they can off their rival. It's been awesome racing. For those of you who haven't been paying attention at www.universalsports.com, please get over there and catch up. They have great commentary, no commercials (amazing!), and video is available either live or on-demand. Versus and OLN Canada should be paying attention. Great work Universal!
The other big story outside of the top few riders is the resurgence of Lance Armstrong. He suffered mightily in the first week, losing 3 minutes on one stage and 2 more on another steep finish. But this week, he has been more like the old Lance, with a few more surges late in stages. He actually attacked and caught up to a group of 6 on Monday that included Carlos Sastre, Danilo Diluca, Stefano Garzelli, Ivan Basso, and Denis Menchov during the last climb, but got called back to help out teammate Levi Leipheimer, who was still in the Top 3 until he faded during that stage. Then he made a late surge during Wednesday's epic climb to the Blockhaus, where he tried to bridge across to eventual stage winner Franco Pellizotti. It's nice to see him back at the front of the peloton. That's not to say he's ready to win the Tour (he's still lost over 5 minutes to Denis Menchov this week and only sits in 12th overall) but he's a lot closer than he appeared in Week 1.
With one more big mountain stage on Friday, and the final time trial on Sunday, I'm sure Lance will try to add his name to the headlines once more. Good luck...
Okay, that might be it for this week...enjoy the last three days of the Giro!
No comments:
Post a Comment