Big Ironweekend this weekend, yesterday already we had the 70.3 races in Vichy(Fr) and the full Ironman in Kalmar, Sweden! With Raymond taking the AG win in Sweden the weekend started excellent for our athletes! Raymond added a 12th Kona qualification for 2022. Some of our athletes will not take their qualifier slot, but will choose for other challenging races.

Today Ironman started with the races in which athletes can qualify for the 2023 Ironman World champs in Kona, Hawaii! Our athletes were ready to blow the juice out their legs and turn it into speed in Vichy (France) and Kopenhagen (Denmark).

In Vichy our athletes got a tough course ahead of them, which all 3 (Sander, Sven and Hans) like a lot.
In the first 1/4of the bikecourse the race was very dense, gaps between athletes were rather small. But once the first hills came up the gaps got bigger. Hans became leader in his AG. Sander and Sven started moving up at this point. Unfortunately after 3/4 into the race Sven got mechanical problems with his Di2 and could only shift between 53*12 and 39*12 starting from that point. A bummer for an athlete who had a perfect preparation.

Once the athletes passed halfway the bikecourse it became clear that gaps became bigger and Hans went towards the lead of the overall race. A gap that he made bigger in the last part of the bikecourse. This by pacing well and staying consistent throughout the bike effort.

After 180K bikes could go in T2 and the first steps on the marathon course were made!
42K ahead, being at the lead. It can be stressful or it can give wings. Hans remained calm and did what he had to do, focussing on his own race and see what happens 40K later.

A perfect run, on the right moment at the right place made Hans run his marathon in 3h06′ and finish 26″ ahead of the fast French runner Noblet. A strong race of the French athlete but in the end the winner takes it all! Today the winner is Hans, a performance to cherish! He joins a list of Belgian Ironmanwinners that’s not too large! Great job!

Sven suffered on the bike with his mechanical problems on a demanding course, his legs surely were affected by this. But despite this he kept strong and his goal was still 42K ahead! Those 42K he still managed to run in 3h25′ and this brought him to 24th AG position!
He was closely followed by Sander who finished 3′ later in 30th AG position!

In Denmark Thibaud (Switzerland), Frédéric (Belgium) and Anil (Belgium) took a very good start!

Thibaud came out of the water after 54′, Frédéric in 57′ and Anil in his first Ironman effort in 80′.
All 3 athletes performed well during today’s swim!
On the bike pacing was meant to be perfect and so it went! We saw very strong bike splits of Thibaud and Frédéric without overusing and staying in the right pacing zone. Thibaud came off the bike in 20th position, Frédéric in 22nd position.

Thibaud has a good run in his legs and already showed in Cozumel 2021 what he’s capable of!
Today he moved up from 20th to 10th position in the run with a 3h21′ run. Another AG top 10 for him today. Finishing in 9h07′, while Frédéric finishes just above 10h in 10h02′!

Anil managed his first Ironman in 13h15, in the end it’s not only the fastest one who gains respect by performance in triathlon! Good job!

Train smart perform better,

Jesse