At this weekend’s Rohto Ironman 70.3 Miami a pair of Germans duelled it out in the men’s race with Sebastian Kienle handing Michael Raelert a rare defeat in an Ironman 70.3 race. In the women’s competition Leanda Cave dominated in all three disciplines on her way to a successful defence of her title in Miami.
Kienle establishes lead on the bike – hangs on during the run
New Zealand’s Dylan McNeice set the pace for the men’s field in the 1.2-mile swim, exiting Biscayne Bay in 24:12. A chase pack of ten, all within 45-seconds of the leader, followed, including prerace favourites Raelert and Australia’s Matt Reed.
Kienle put on a time trial clinic as pedaled out a race best 2:01:54 on the single-looped 56-mile course. Raelert and Reed were within seconds of each other as they hit T2, but found themselves two minutes in arrears to Kienle.
Raelert initially made inroads into Kienle’s lead during the opening half of the run. Kienle never faltered under the pressure mounted from behind, though, and went onto claim victory. Raelert recorded the fastest run of the day to finish second, but only managed to claw back one-minute of his two-minute disadvantage from the start of the run. Reed hung on to round out the podium.
Today’s win by Kienle marks only the second occasion that Raelert has been defeated at the 70.3 distance – Kienle also beat the two-time Ironman 70.3 world champion at the 2009 Ironman 70.3 European Championship in Wiesbaden Germany.
Professional men’s results
| 1 | Sebastian Kienle | 3:47:01 |
| 2 | Michael Raelert | 3:48:01 |
| 3 | Matt Reed | 3:49:37 |
| 4 | Alberto Casadei | 3:51:26 |
| 5 | Richard Allen | 3:51:35 |
| 6 | Stanislav Krylov | 3:54:08 |
| 7 | Bertrand Billard | 3:54:32 |
| 8 | Horst Reichel | 3:54:42 |
| 9 | Dylan McNeice | 3:57:05 |
| 10 | Patrick Evoe | 3:58:20 |
Cave in control all day
In the women’s race, Great Britain’s Leanda Cave hit the shore with a swim time of 27:01. Hot on her heels, only seconds back, were Germany’s Nina Kraft, Great Britain’s Emma-Kate Lidbury and American Amanda Felder Derkacs.
Showing no effects from her third-place showing at the Ironman World Championship earlier this month, Cave proceeded to put in the fastest bike split on the day and carried a two-minute advantage over Felder Derkacs into T2. Further back, but not out of contention, were Lidbury, USA’s Jessica Myers and Canadian Magali Tisseyre.
Out on the run no one could outmatch Caves’s pace as she went on to successfully defend her Rohto Ironman 70.3 Miami title. Tisseyre managed to pull herself into second on the strength of her strong run, however Cave’s winning margin of 7:37 was an indication of her dominance today in her wire-to-wire-win. Lidbury fell off the pace during the run but held on to the final podium position.
Professional women’s results
| 1 | Leanda Cave | 4:13:35 |
| 2 | Magali Tisseyre | 4:21:12 |
| 3 | Emma-Kate Lidbury | 4:23:11 |
| 4 | Jessica Meyers | 4:24:13 |
| 5 | Amanda Felder Derkacs | 4:29:23 |
| 6 | Jennifer Tetrick | 4:29:28 |
| 7 | Racel McBride | 4:35:20 |
| 8 | Heather Gollnick | 4:36:01 |
| 9 | Ariane Monticelli | 4:37:41 |
| 10 | Jessica Chong | 4:41:27 |
Shawn Skene can be reached at Shawn.Skene@Ironman.com
