Big weekend review: A Bayliss double, Paterson claims World Title and breakthrough Abraham performance.
It was a huge weekend on the WTC circuit and most of the headlines were written at Ironman Lanzarote – namely Graves suicide drive on the bike and the Bayliss’ demonstrating the perfectly paced Ironman to take double podiums.
Lanzarote wasn’t the only race though and British Isles triathletes were performing at Ironman Texas, Columbia, the ITU World Cross Tri World Championships and much more.
Starting in Lanzarote, it was Graves making the early waves as he set out at breakneck pace onto Lanzarote’s infamous bike course. He had told me that he felt the race had never before been won on the bike – he was obviously going to test that theory himself. It was however, a pace that he couldn’t maintain – not on his self-confessed lack of run training anway – and he withdrew after 13 miles of the run. This is the second DNF picked up on this course. Graves has also only finished Ironman UK (albeit with a win) and Ironman World Championships in his career… begs the question, will this young talent ever get his pacing right on the biggest stage? We’ll find out more at Ironman Austria – which has been identified as an A target.
Meanwhile, Bella and Stephen Bayliss were making waves for all the right reasons. Stephen demonstrated masterful pacing to take 2nd in the men’s race. Bella produced an outstanding performance to also take second in her first long course race in 21 months. What a pro and athlete she is. Bryan McCrystal can have every reason to feel proud of himself, taking 12th on his debut.
The full Ironman Lanzarote race report can be found here.
Corinne Abraham was putting in an excellent performance in Ironman Texas. By combing PB performances in each of the disciplines she took 4th place and a huge points bonus in the P-2000 race.
Eimear Mullan took a solid 9th at Ironman Austria 70.3. This race was where the action was for middle distance racing this weekend – never mind Armstrong circus in Florida – and Mullan showed she could mix it at the top. I’ll be speaking to Eimear later this week.
Lesley Paterson, the XTERRA specialist claimed another World Title at the ITU Cross Tri World Championships. The Scottish star is chasing glory on three counts this year, and can now focus on reclaiming the XTERRA title and qualifying for the Ironman 70.3 championship.
In Bilboa, Fraser Cartmell was again demonstrating that he has his mojo back and took 3rd at the middle distance race. Ali Rowatt was in 6th and confessed on Twitter she had a difficult race.
Leanda Cave was in very impressive form at the Columbia Triathlon and came 2nd in a time of 2:07:17. Unusually for her she was racing Olympic distance and I think she likes it:
2nd @tricolumbia = pain = #happy
Craig Twigg was spending the weekend winning another race, this time the BRAT Sprint Distance event.
Age Grouper, Laura Trimble, who wrote such a fantastic report of her Kona qualifying race at Ironman St George, was in action again and came 3rd in age group at Ironman Florida 70.3 – claiming a Vegas slot in the process. Congratulations.
Catherine Jameson was also in action this weekend, producing a performance worthy of 7th place at the Kansas 5150 race.
And finally, a bit of gossip… I noticed that the ITU star, Will Clarke was tweeting with Phil Graves at the weekend and said:
Mental just getting round it. Hope to join you one day!
Is that the first hint that long distance features in his plans? I’ll try and find out.
