The IRONMAN Pro Series awards ceremony with Jackie Hering, Kat Matthews and Lotte Wilms. Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

You’d be smiling, too, if you had just won yourself a nice US$200,000 bonus for winning the IRONMAN Pro Series. We were on hand as Kat Matthews was handed that big check after a stellar season that included a runner-up finish at both the IRONMAN World Championship in Nice and the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship in Taupo. That bonus helped Matthews to earn a total of $549,000 last year, “the best earning season of any of the years I have looked at,” wrote Thorsten Radde, the man behind TriRating.com, who posted his annual year-end prize money ranking on Dec. 31.

It hardly comes as a surprise, then, that during an interview last week he was quick to agree with me that there’s never been a better time to be a pro triathlete.

“Oh, totally,” Radde said. “And, to me, Kat (Matthews) is an example. Martin Van Riel is an example. The amount of money that’s available in the middle distance, it’s never been better before. And, overall, it’s never been better before.”

Matthews finished just ahead of Taylor Knibb on the prize money ranking ($549,000 to $517,300), with Knibb earning the lion’s share of her prize money through the PTO – $410,000 from her four series wins and the overall T100 title. Van Riel, the winner of the men’s T100 series, took home $401,000 from the PTO, earning an additional $9,500 from World Triathlon and $2,500 from Ironman to take home a total of $413,000. Ashleigh Gentle was fourth in the overall standings with $354,427, while Kyle Smith rounded out the top five with $326,848.

Radde, who also consults with the Professional Triathletes Organisation (PTO) and has been a key player in the development of the ranking system used by the PTO, points out that the T100 Triathlon World Tour and the IRONMAN Pro Series “have created a significant addition of prize money into long-distance triathlon.”

That boost in prize money allowed 49 athletes to make over $100,000 last year, up from 29 athletes in 2023.

Ranking Systems

A win at IRONMAN 70.3 Western Australia helped Gregory Barnaby take the men’s IRONMAN Pro Series title. Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

It should hardly come as a suprise that the man who has been so involved in the PTO ranking system, which takes into consideration the depth of field for each race along with the difficulty of the course, would not be as impressed with the considerably simpler IRONMAN Pro Series system. That Pro Series rankings start with a set number of points for the winner of each event – 5,000 for IRONMAN races, 2,500 for 70.3. (The world championship points start at 6,000 for the full and 3,000 for the 70.3.) The following athletes’ points decrease by a point for every second they are behind – hence the “every second counts” promo the Series has used. (You can read more about the points system here.)

“Obviously the PTO system is a lot more complicated than what IRONMAN has done,” Radde said. “To me it was too-simple a system, and I think it still is. But it’s been working well from a marketing viewpoint. That model of every second counts, and the simple way of being able to count down the points worked well.”

Radde also wasn’t a fan of having three full-distance races count because “it forces people to do a lot of racing if they want to do well.”

“But that’s a discussion that’s older than the Pro series,” he said with a laugh.

More Competitive Than Ever

Do the numbers back up the feeling that pro racing is more competitive than ever? Radde sure thinks so.

“I mean, you just have to go back to Kona Racing in 2010, or 2005,” he said. “You had a handful of people who would win it. And you could be reasonably certain that three of them would place on the podium. I don’t think we’re at that point anymore. You have easily 10 to 15 people who could contend for the podium, and the races are so close and so variable in how they develop. We’ve got the deepest fields, we’ve got the closest races.”

Radde sites a chat with fellow German Frederik Funk as proof of just how competitive the races have become. Funk didn’t win any races in 2024, but felt like his fifth-place performances at T100 London and T100 Ibiza were likely good enough to have won him a PTO event in 2022 or 2023.

It isn’t just the T100 races, either. Radde points to IRONMAN Cozumel, where Marten Van Riel made his full-distance debut.

“I guess in almost all instances five or 10 years ago, if he (Van Riel) crashes and loses some time, he would have been able to run himself back onto the podium,” Radde said. “But no longer. Even if there are names that you’ve never heard before, they’re still able to go super fast and do a sub-eight in their first Ironman, which was unheard of a couple years ago.” 

Short Course Racing

Cassandre Beaugrand competes in the mixed relay at the Olympics. Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

Olympic champ Cassandre Beaugrand topped the short course prize money ranking this year, taking home $219,875 from World Triathlon and SuperTri. Hayden Wilde was second on that list ($198,575), although he augmented his earnings with IRONMAN events and earned $247,575 in total last year. Like Beaugrand, the men’s Olympic champ, Alex Yee, earned all his money through short course racing and ended up third on the list at $162,889.

One last stat we’ll throw at you from Radde’s reporting: “The total number of athletes who earned prize money has been almost unchanged (818 in 2023 vs 823 in 2024).”

The post It’s Never Been a Better Time to Be a Pro Triathlete … And the Numbers Prove It first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

Note that there is no double-dipping at this. With Taylor Knibb winning the voting for Triathlete of the Year, she is ineligible for this award.

Ryan: First, Kevin, I think we probably need to set some parameters as to how we define Long Course, because I’m sure that will ruffle a few feathers.

Kevin: You think? While I don’t necessarily agree with this, I think the PTO has pushed us into a world where T100 and up is now considered long distance. (Which, I note, is hilarious for an organization that was started to help full-distance IRONMAN athletes make more of a living – but that’s fodder for a completely different story or even a podcast!)

Ryan: Yeah. It comes down to thinking that there’s no need to divide up and have a 70.3/T100 distance award – and with World Triathlon dubbing T100 “long course,” we’ll follow along.

Going into the potential nominees, I still think the same case can be made for Kat Matthews that I made for her Triathlete of the Year nomination. Nobody raced more, and across more distances, than she did, and made an absolute killing in bonuses from the IRONMAN Pro Series victory and finishing 4th in the T100 standings. But I think there’s strong arguments for the two women who beat her on some of the larger stages: Ashleigh Gentle and Laura Philipp.

Gentle’s year was similar to that of Matthews; she raced 7 times and was on the podium for 5 of them. Head-to-head, Gentle and Matthews raced 5 times together, with Gentle coming out ahead 3 out of 5 times, including at the T100 Grand Final in Dubai. And although it doesn’t count for the purposes of this award, Gentle also extended her unbelievable win streak in Noosa.

As for Philipp: obviously, she emerged over Matthews in that duel at the IRONMAN World Championships in Nice to take her first world title. She also had her strong second place in Roth. When you race nine times in a year, and your worst finishing position is 7th, that’s an awfully strong campaign. 

For me this comes down to Matthews and Philipp, and it’s not too dissimilar from the point I was trying to make for Triathlete of the Year: I think it’s important that you show the versatility of being able to race both T100/70.3 distance and 140.6. And that’s something that Gentle just has not done.

Kevin: For sure Kat needs to be considered the front-runner on this one. Some notes, though. There was one athlete who actually raced more than Kat last year – I did a profile on Els Visser yesterday. (I did note right off the bat in that piece that she wasn’t likely to be in the running for any Triathlete of the Year awards, but did enjoy a pretty spectacular season.) There’s another name I would add to the discussion – Anne Haug. If you asked me in July who was going to be the Triathlete of the Year, I would have been willing to bet it would be her. I was in Lanzarote when she broke Paula Newby Fraser’s long-standing course record, and wished I had made it to Roth to watch that otherworldly 8:02:38 performance. I truly couldn’t see any way she wasn’t going to win Nice at that point – I hope my beliefs didn’t jinx her.

Unfortunately, as amazing as those two performances were, the rest of the season wasn’t Triathlete of the Year worthy. (Yes, I am also asking myself why I even went down that road, but it just seemed weird not to have any mention of Haug in this mix!)

I agree on your Ashleigh Gentle points, Ryan. I don’t think she ends up ahead of either Kat or Laura based on her mostly T100, with a touch of 70.3 and a dash of Olympic-distance (Noosa) race season.  

Which leaves us with the Kat / Laura debate for this one. I do believe there is an argument for giving Laura Philipp the award here. As you pointed out, her two “worst” performances were the pair of seventh-place finishes at T100 Lake Las Vegas and T100 Dubai, both of which came after her incredible day in Nice. It’s impressive to me she even made it to those races. People in North America have no idea how big a deal it is to be an IRONMAN world champion over in Germany. The sponsor and media requirements for her after winning Nice must have been nuts. 

Philipp’s year was truly focussed on Nice, too. After the race she told me that she’d had it in her head that the race in Nice was her best shot at a world title from the day IRONMAN announced they would be heading there. So, I guess it comes down to what people think is most important when it comes to picking a Triathlete of the Year. Consistency? Being able to take the world title? A combination of the two?

Happy to hear any arguments, or simply send this to a vote!

Ryan: I think this one is awfully close. In my opinion, you have to give some additional weight to performing at both IRONMAN world championship races (and, for that matter, Dubai as well). But I suppose we can send it to a vote.

The post 2024 Slowtwitch Awards: Women’s Long Course Athlete of the Year first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

No, she won’t be part of any Triathlete of the Year conversations. But that’s not to say that The Netherlands’ Els Visser didn’t enjoy a spectacular 2024 that saw her race in 16 races that were T100-distance or longer. She won Challenge Wanaka in February after finishing third in Tauranga in January. She was second at IRONMAN New Zealand, third at T100 Singapore, won Ironman 70.3 Philippines, won Challenge Taiwan, finished fifth at IRONMAN Hamburg, was third at Challenge Roth (in 8:24, no less!), took second at IRONMAN Vitoria-Gasteiz, second at Challenge Xiamen and rounded out the season with a sixth at IRONMAN 70.3 Western Australia and 17th at the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship. (Yes, I know that’s three short of 16 races – there was a 10th and a fifth at 70.3 Tallinn and Zell am See, along with a DNF in Nice, but we’ll get to that.)

To give you an idea of just how much racing that is, consider the fact that we’ve been raving about just how much Kat Matthews achieved in 2024, and she started 11 races last year.

Here’s the crazy thing about Els Visser, though. Once you’ve heard her story, it hardly comes as a surprise that she would 1) take on such a challenging schedule and 2) that she’d excel through it.

Red Bull Documentary

Sometime in 2025 we’ll have a chance to get even more details about Visser’s experience in 2014 when a documentary by her sponsor, Red Bull, is released. The producers have been following Visser since 2019, gathering footage for the show, which will look back at the harrowing experience Visser and 24 other crew and tourists endured during boat trip from Lombok to Flores in Bali, Indonesia. (Visser describes the trip in her own words here.)

Visser was just finishing up a gynaecology and obstetrics internship in Bali. It was her last week before returning to the Netherlands to finish up her medical training, and she decided to go to Flores to do some scuba diving. A few days in, during a storm, the boat went down, leaving the five-member crew and 20 tourists scrambling to survive.

“We had one lifeboat without a motor or a paddle, but it was something for six people to sit in,” Visser remembers. “Other people were sitting on the roof of the sinking boat or were in the ocean around the lifeboat, and we were just waiting for morning.”

“We waited the whole night in the dark ocean,” she continued. “Balancing on the sinking boat, just hanging around in the ocean and then the sun came up and we started to see that islands in the far distance.” 

Even though the water was 26-27 degrees C (80-82 F), Visser was freezing as the sun started to rise. After a few more hours, she decided to try to swim to the island they could see in the distance. There were a few others who tried to go with her, but in the end she would be separated from the others – it was just her and another woman from New Zealand who eventually made it. They swam for about eight hours, getting there just before sunset. Once there, they realized they were on a volcanic island (Sangeang Api) with nothing on it. They found about a half-cup of fresh water, and then started to save their own urine, realizing that they would likely have to start drinking that over the next few days.

Luckily enough they were rescued the following day, and eventually all but two of the people from the boat were saved. Two Spanish passengers, who ironically were sailors themselves, were never found.

A week after the ordeal Visser was back at school, struggling to deal with the trauma. She would eventually turn to running to clear her mind. She did her first marathon in October, 2015, finishing in 3:30. Just under a year later she did her first triathlon – a sprint event in Amsterdam, which she won. Someone at work told her about IRONMAN, and she figured that she would be best to train for one while she was doing her PhD (since she didn’t have “night or weekend shifts”).

That led her to IRONMAN Switzerland in 2017, where she finished fourth overall. Six months later she was in Australia competing in her first pro race – she finished 10th at IRONMAN Western Australia.

Heavy Race Schedule

Visser has been working with Trisutto coaches for much of her professional career, but began working with Brett Sutton himself in 2021. Last year she competed 12 times in a season that included wins at IRONMAN New Zealand, Challenge Almere and Challenge Canberra. Visser feels that all this racing works for her.

“I’ve been training super continuously without interruptions,” she said in an interview a couple of days before IRONMAN 70.3 Western Australia. “I recover very quickly from my races. And I also really believe that each race makes me better. It gives me another experience and, with the philosophy of training we do, we don’t really taper into a race and after a race we continue training.”

“I really believe that every race is another experience, another challenge to make me physically and mentally stronger,” she continued. “And, in the end, we are here to race, to challenge ourselves and to test ourselves. So, I just enjoy racing a lot.”

Visser can also point to the success she’s enjoyed from the busy schedule. A week after her third-place finish in Roth, she was second to Matthews at IRONMAN Vitoria-Gasteiz. In both cases she points out that those were the best possible results she could have hoped for – beating Anne Haug on her record-setting day in Roth (or Laura Philipp, the eventual IRONMAN world champion) wasn’t likely to happen. Neither was beating a super-fit and fast Matthews in Spain the following week.

“I think, at this moment, it is still about getting my run to the next level, getting my swim to the next level, and that every race just makes me stronger,” she said.

Visser’s body did finally betray her heading into Nice when she was slowed by a stress fracture in her fibula that forced her to pull out of the race. She was able to bounce back to take second at Challenge Xiamen a few months later, then rounded out the season with sixth in Busselton and 17th at the 70.3 worlds in Taupo.

Endless Situation

Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

So how does surviving a shipwreck change the life view of a professional triathlete?

“It’s fading away over the years, but it’s always in my heart,” Visser said. “And it really changed me … It was just like a super endless situation. I was just convinced that my life would come to an end. And so I was very surprised when we got rescued after two days. That’s just like the power of the human body and the mental strength. And, in such an extreme situation, somehow you just find another gear and you just don’t give up and you just find a way to battle through it. Some power. I never realized it’s a power you have physically and mentally, and that’s what I really like now in triathlon – that you have to use the same power to cross that finish line.”

“That was really an eye opener to me to discover that inner strength of our human bodies,” she continued. “And then, meanwhile, I’m just super grateful now, every day, that I’m here … I always appreciated life, but I think now I appreciate it even more. It’s living day by day, enjoying the small moments. Being grateful that I’m still here, that I have the opportunity to live my life.”

Ironically, the experience has also had an interesting affect on her approach to racing.

“I can find, sometimes, that extra gear because I’ve been through worse,” she said. “But what I find very difficult is that there’s always a safe way out. An option that you can quit a race and nothing will happen.”

“I was was in a situation that actually I had to keep swimming towards that island because otherwise I was going to die,” she said. “Actually it was pretty easy that way as well, because there was just no other option than just swimming, and then your mind is just focused … but in triathlon there’s always that safe way out.”

IRONMAN Pro Series for 2025

Visser hadn’t really intended to put much focus on the inaugural year of the IRONMAN Pro Series, but found herself in a position where she was doing well. She’ll take a different tack this year.

“Somehow I worked my way into the series and got some good points,” she said. “I think, for next year, I really want to focus on the IRONMAN Series and pick the races better strategy and really aim for it a bit more.” 

The post Think You Had a Strange Journey to Triathlon? Meet Els Visser first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

The way Matthews bounced back from that challenge, though, pretty much personifies her season – she got on a plane and flew to San Francisco, where she took second to Taylor Knibb at the T100 event the following weekend. She followed that up with yet another IRONMAN win at Vitoria-Gasteiz, then bounced back two weeks later to take third at T100 London.

Racing well week in and week out is one thing, but Matthews also proved to be at her very best when it counted, taking second at both the IRONMAN world championship events. So, while she is thrilled to have taken the Pro Series title (along with fourth in the T100 Triathlon World Tour), she was rightfully proud of her ability to race well when it really counted.

“This is the first year that the (Pro) series has been running,” she said. “I think in future years it will just grow and grow and grow and it will really draw people into this sort of multirace series. “I think to get second here (in Taupo) and second at the full IRONMAN (Nice), I think that’s what I’m really proud of.”

“I think consistency isn’t always super sexy, but … I’ve really peaked for the big races,” she continued, referring to her runner-up finish to Laura Philipp in Nice and then her second-place finish behind Taylor Knibb in Taupo. “So this race I really trained for and to come 1:15 behind Taylor, that’s a sort of PB for me, so it’s not just the consistency. I’ve been able to see those significant, key races as my pinnacle, key races.”

Comeback

It’s hard to believe that just a few years ago we were all wondering if Matthews would ever return to the highest levels of the sport. Just 10 days before the IRONMAN World Championship in Kona, Matthews was hit by a car.

“She fractured her skull, two vertebrae in her neck, her sternum, a rib and she recently also discovered she’d fractured her hip socket,” the Daily Mirror reported as she prepared to return to racing in April, 2023. “By her own admission she could have died in that crash.”

While we might all be amazed at her impressive return to the highest levels of the sport, she has very much moved on.

“You know, the first six months of recovery was more about getting back to professional racing,” she said. “Now I’m better than I ever have been. That was a PB run, you know, this year I’ve put down PB bike power, PB swim, so it’s not about getting back.  It’s more about genuine gratitude for being able to race and to have this as my job, and to be around so many people who love the sport – this is literally my dream.

Second Career

Matthews has surged to the top of the triathlon world after having served in the British Armed Forces for many years. It remains a key part of what drives her in triathlon.

“That community, and the support from the British army, it is fundamental and it makes me really believe I’m not just fighting for myself as an individual, I’m fighting for for everybody to get behind that ethos of trying to be your best,” she said. “It really motivates me. And we even have people here who are posted from the British army overseas in New Zealand coming to support the race. So it really fills my heart.” 

2025 Racing

At the post-race press conference, Matthews made reference to trying to figure out what changes needed to be made in order to beat Knibb. I couldn’t help but ask if she thought that a reduced race schedule might help.

“To be honest, I actually feel like I’ve got fitter after every race,” Matthews said. “For this race, I don’t think I was disadvantaged by a busy racing schedule. Perhaps you could say for the full IRONMAN I need to commit to slightly different training or, you know, change something up in terms of my preparation, especially for Kona, so that’s definitely something I’m going to take into 2025, but for this specific race, no, I don’t feel like my schedule impacted it.”

All of which means we’re likely to see Matthews at a lot of races again next year. Consistency might not be sexy, but it sure can make for an impressive, and it sure doesn’t hurt the bank account.

The post Kat Matthews: Consistency Might Not Be “Super Sexy,” but it Pays Off in the End first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

For this article, we’re looking solely at the viewing experience from this weekend’s IRONMAN 70.3 Worlds coverage broadcast on the Outside Watch platform. Although I could have easily VPN’d myself into a YouTube coverage experience, I wanted to be able to review it as IRONMAN intended the experience for American and Canadian audiences.

Race Action Coverage: B

For the most part, across both days, the critical moves on course were captured. On Saturday alone we got to see, for instance, Taylor Knibb rocket her way past Sara Perez Sala and never give that lead up again. We were with Kat Matthews as she made her critical bridge up to Imogen Simmonds and Paula Findlay. And we saw the gap get agonizingly tight between Knibb and Matthews on the second lap of the run.

On the men’s side, we had a healthy back and forth between the leading group of 8 men and the 9 man deep chase group. We also got to see the pack dynamics within those two groups, as the likes of Lèo Bergère, Hayden Wilde, and Rico Bogen traded places back and forth throughout the lead pack, whereas Kristian Høgenhaug repeatedly tried to break the chase apart. And, of course, we watched Wilde’s lead evaporate in the span of two kilometers as Jelle Geens wrested the title from his hands.

We also saw a fair amount of “the race within the race” battles for positions within the IRONMAN Pro Series. It helped, of course, that Matthews was right at the front of the women’s field, but we also saw Matthew Marquardt’s struggles on the bike and run as he came up short in his bid to take the Series crown. On the flip side, Gregory Barnaby’s run and finish were missed completely. It also was somewhat surprising to not have him included in the immediate post-race interviews, having won the Series.

Camera Work: C-

I am admittedly sensitive to camera jostling and shaky images, thanks to my concussion history and mild visual processing issues. So when, during the broadcast Sunday, the camera feed swapped to chasing Høgenhaug as he looked to establish himself with the chase group on a downhill, I started feeling sick to my stomach. Høgenhaug was, at best, half in frame, and with the image bouncing everywhere.

It, unfortunately, was not much better on the run segment for the men. Even the critical pass for the race featured a fair amount of bounce.

The women’s race was not as bad. Whether that was due to the bike pace being slower, or if there were different camera operators in place each day, it made it slightly better. But clearly there was an issue of either equipment or operator given the conditions that were faced on the day. I was very glad to be done watching at the end.

Studio Broadcasters: B-

Michael Lovato and Dede Griesbauer have a thankless job. Being able to talk for hours on end, with what amounts to the same talking points, and make it at least mildly entertaining is extremely hard. There are precious few traditional broadcasters who are able to pull this off.

Lovato and Griesbauer have good chemistry with one another, and their passion for the sport comes through, which on the whole makes their broadcasting palatable. However, there are two areas with plenty of room for improvement. First is on athlete identification; both misidentified athletes on camera multiple times, but particularly during the men’s race. That would be more forgivable if more information about what was happening off-camera was being relayed to the pair and able to tell that story effectively.

For example: it was not until after the race that we heard of any bike penalties beyond the one to then-leader Mathis Margirier, and we only knew of that because we saw him pull into a penalty tent. More often than not, the duo are being forced to rely on what’s coming in via the tracker versus getting any information from spotters on the ground. That means when you have situations where timing boxes aren’t relaying information — like they failed during the women’s race on the bike — they, and us the audience, are left to wonder what is happening on course.

On Course Broadcasters: B+

Craig Alexander, Mirinda Carfrae, Matt Lieto, and Greg Welch combined to give great detail and analysis throughout their hours on-screen. In particular, Carfrae has proven herself to be an excellent addition to any broadcast she’s on. She is knowledgeable, insightful, entertaining, and versatile; she’s able to go from reporter to interviewer to host relatively seamlessly. Lieto, too, does a good job in his role heading out on course, whether on the back of a motorcycle or at a specific point during the run.

The primary letdown? Technical issues out on the bike course when Lieto was attempting to relay information.

On-Screen Graphics: C

Can we all please just admit that trying to use AI to write race predictions, based on old timing split data, is a terrible idea? It was at its worst as Wilde’s lead was evaporating, as the AI predictor was still trying to say that Wilde would win and run a time that he clearly was no longer capable of.

Perhaps the most useful graphic on screen was the topographic map to show where the lead of the race was. However, the placement of it in the bottom-third, which was cluttered with AI text and other items, versus in some of the empty space at the top, hindered the intended effect.

And, much like with other race formats, it only focused on the head of the race; it never gave splits back through the field, so unless you had your IRONMAN app on the entire time, you’d have never known what was happening for non-podium places until athletes crossed the finish line.

Commercials: B-

I am not counting any of the infomercial / in-broadcast advertising; this is just in reference to the actual ad units that the broadcast would cut to.

It’s very easy to hate on the advertising during an IRONMAN broadcast. You’re pretty much guaranteed to see ads for Qatar Airways, HOKA, Wahoo, Maurten, Breitling, Vinfast, etc. on a countless loop. And the ad breaks themselves often have impeccable timing; for example, starting the women’s coverage, there was an ad break less than three minutes into the broadcast. Coming right off of the back of the ad unit that had to be watched in order to access the broadcast, it can leave a sour taste in your mouth.

That said, I wound up counting up and timing the broadcast breaks on Saturday. There were 20 total commercial breaks during Saturday’s race, which constituted roughly 11% of the total broadcast time. For comparison’s sake, in your average NFL three hour game broadcast, a full 25% of the broadcast is commercials.

In other words: it’s really not as bad as it seems, at least from a time perspective. But better ad break coordination (especially, say, not missing the finish of your Pro Series champion on the live stream) would improve the experience greatly.

Platform Stability: A-

For as poor of a platform Outside Watch was during the original go-round of IRONMAN broadcasts, it has come an awful long way. There was only one moment towards the end of the bike during the men’s race where I suffered a moment of buffering. Otherwise, the platform was about as bulletproof as it possibly could be.

Overall Grade: B-

IRONMAN produced another decent triathlon livestream broadcast. It’s free for us to watch. We saw the major moments of the race, and it didn’t glitch. Although there’s definitely room for improvement, it scratches the itch for most of triathlon’s existing audience.

The post Grading IRONMAN’s 70.3 Worlds Broadcast first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

Matthews’ dual second place performances at IRONMAN World Championship events propelled her past long-time series leader Jackie Hering to the top spot on the podium.

Following her performance at the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship this weekend, Matthews commented: “I’m really proud to finish the year with the goal that we set out at the start and I think…pulling that together with everything else going on has been a real logistical challenge, as well as a physical one. The funding behind it [IRONMAN Pro Series] and our reward, really enables us to travel to places like New Zealand, and do these races properly, with professionalism and considering our health and performance on race day… Hopefully I’ve set a good benchline for the future years of the IRONMAN Pro Series.” 

Barnaby, however, had to take a different road to the title. He came into the weekend with the IRONMAN Pro Series lead, in part because he had scored already in the maximum five events. The most likely scenario for him to hold onto the lead was to beat Matthew Marquardt to the finish line. Barnaby did just that as Marquardt struggled with cramping.

Barnaby said after clinching his title: “I’ve been doing triathlon for 20 years now and I’ve never earned in 20 years what I earned today, it’s amazing. It’s been an amazing year for me, a really long season, it was amazing to take the win in Western Australia [at the IRONMAN 70.3 Asia-Pacific Championship Western Australia triathlon], it wouldn’t have been the same to take the Series without taking a win in an actual race in the Pro Series so I’m really happy.”

Matthews’ Road to Victory

Matthews had remarkable consistency throughout the year, with five podium finishes to her name at IRONMAN and IRONMAN 70.3 events.

Matthews started her Pro Series campaign with a victory at IRONMAN Texas. She followed that by another victory at IRONMAN Vitoria-Gastiez, where she won with a comfortable eight minute margin, thanks to a dominating 2:54 marathon

Next came a second-place finish at 70.3 Tallin. But it was her remarkable duel with eventual IRONMAN World Champion Laura Philipp that saw Matthews rocket up the Pro Series leaderboard. That second place gave Matthews a firm grasp on second place, and with an open score available to her at 70.3 Worlds, any finish would see Matthews wrest the title from long-time leader Hering.

Hering, who had held first since a second-place at this summer’s IRONMAN Lake Placid, did not improve upon her score this weekend. Still, with over 18,000 points, Hering was able to take second place and the $130,000 check associated with it.

Lotte Wilms rounded out the podium, moving past Hannah Berry with her effort at 70.3 Worlds.

The top 10 finishers in the 2024 Pro Series are as follows:

Barnaby’s Title Journey

Barnaby came into the Series-deciding race having scored in five races this season, including an excellent sixth-place at the IRONMAN World Championship in Kona and his first IRONMAN 70.3 victory at Western Australia. That win propelled him past IRONMAN World Champion Patrick Lange into the lead of the Series.

It set the stage for a one-on-one battle between Barnaby and Matthew Marquardt for the lead in the series. Marquardt, like Matthews, had only scored in four events coming into the finale in Taupō. It meant whoever came to the finish line first between those two, so long as they were within 8:46 of the winner, would wind up Pro Series champion.

Unfortunately for Marquardt, it was not to be; he struggled mightily with cramping as soon as the race hit the bike and would finish in 36th place. That would still be enough to move him into fourth place in the Series standings and to take home a $70,000 check.

Marquardt’s misfortune solidified Barnaby’s and Lange’s 1-2 finish. Kristian Høgenhaug, who led the chase group on the bike during 70.3 Worlds, finished 17th on Sunday and earned enough points for the final podium spot.

The final top 10 standings:

The 2025 Pro Series will kick off in three months, with IRONMAN 70.3 Geelong and spanning until next year’s IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships in Marbella, Spain in November.

The post Matthews and Barnaby Take Inaugural IM Pro Series Crowns first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

All Photos: Kevin Mackinnon / Slowtwitch

Jelle Geens passed long-time leader Hayden Wilde with three kilometers left to run to claim his first IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship. Geens made his move in the final quarter of the race, as he closed a 45 second deficit to Wilde in two kilometers, then making the decisive move in kilometer 18 of the run.

Geens was toward the front of the race from the gun, swimming with the likes of Wilde, Kyle Smith, and defending champion Rico Bogen. Those men formed the bulk of a lead eight man bike pack that traded blows throughout the bike portion. Wilde would attempt to rocket away during the run, building a nearly minute lead over Geens at one point, but would pay dearly for that effort during the second half of the run. Geens 1:07:34 half marathon was enough to propel him to victory.

Wilde took yet another silver medal on a world stage, this time on home soil. And, much like the Paris Olympic Games, Léo Bergère took bronze, unable to catch Wilde again.

Post-race, Geens was ecstatic. “It’ll take some time to realize. It’s something you only dream about. A crazy day. I’ve been in this sport for a long time, and I’ve been doing ITU for a long time. It’s had its ups and downs…and for my first time to come to this race and become world champion…unbelievable.”

Speaking on the dynamics of the race, he said, “I wanted to not tire my legs too much at the end of the bike, I’ve really struggled in the second part of the run. It was easy to try to run too fast, so after a couple K I said I had to settle, find my rhythm. I didn’t really believe it anymore, but I kept putting pressure.”

Wilde, on the race, said: “I put a big ambition out there, obviously I went out there a bit naive. I felt like I rode appropriately. I know these roads like the back of my hand. I got the gap and felt really confident. I think all the short course guys can say this too, but it’s really hard to slow yourself down in the first 10K. I was too excited.”

Bergère said, “The whole bike I found very hard, a really tough experience riding in the group like this. I was spending a lot of energy falling too far back. By the end of the bike everyone was going crazy again and I decided to save my legs for the run. I was expecting a good race, I was targeting the title, but Jelle was just so strong today; even on the bike he surprised me, and he deserved the win. A special mention to Hayden as well, he was attacking and kept the race exciting.”

In the Pro Series battle, Gregory Barnaby was able to claim the crown with his 9th place finish here. Matthew Marquardt suffered from cramps very early on in the race and finished outside the top 30.

As the Race Unfolded

Race day dawned with mild temperatures and light winds. Like the women’s race yesterday, the water did have some chop to it, which would negate some of the benefit that the wetsuit-legal temperatures would provide. Unfortunately, Casper Stornes was a race morning withdrawal, still recovering from a run-in with a vehicle earlier in the week while riding.

Almost all of the pre-race favorites lined up on the far left side of the beach, closest to the first turn buoy, with defending champion Rico Bogen lining up the furthest to the left. As the airhorn sounded and athletes dove into Lake Taupō, it looked like the athletes on the left were making ahead, with Marc Dubrick leading the pack. The frantic pace saw athletes starting to be dropped before that first turn buoy, just 300 meters into the swim.

Making their way into the sun, Dubrick led an attempted breakaway, with Léo Bergère, Greg Harper, and Josh Amberger alongside him. In the chase group of roughly 20 swimmers were athletes like Kyle Smith, Hayden Wilde, Gregory Barnaby, and Matthew Marquardt. But as other athletes in the lead group took their turn on the front, the chase group was able to re-attach itself around the 600 meter mark, giving a large single pack again.

The group started to stretch out again around the 1000 meter mark, with a single-file line of about 15 swimmers before getting back to a slightly larger pack. Harper had gone to the front, and his effort was so strong that he was beginning to drop the rest of the leaders. At the final turn buoy, he’d successfully broken away from the Bergère group.

Harper earned swim prime honors in 21:48, with a 12 second margin over Amberger, Bergère, and Dubrick. The main chase came another 15 seconds later, with Bogen, Henri Schoeman, Hayden Wilde, Kyle Smith, Jelle Geens, and Kacper Stepniak there. Gregory Barnaby led the second chase group another 30 seconds down, with Braden Currie, Matthew Marquardt, and Jason West also in the mix.

Bergère used his World Triathlon Championship Series experience to blitz through transition and lead everyone out onto the bike. Wilde and Geens also jumped through the field via fast transitions. Bogen, Amberger, Smith, and Stepniak all were right up front starting the bike segment, as a pack of 9 men formed. Crucially for the Pro Series standings, Marquardt was well off the pace and suffering from cramps.

The leading 9 men – Bergère, Wilde, Geens, Bogen, Dubrick, Schoeman, Amberger, Justus Nieschlag, and Smith – had opened up a roughly 30 second lead over Mathis Margirier. A bit further down came Barnaby, who was riding with Stepniak. They were 10 seconds in front of a sizable pack, led by Ben Hamilton and including names like Harper, Mike Phillips, Currie, and West. Looking to chase onto that group was Høgenhaug.

Rolling through the hills towards the 20 kilometer mark and the leading pack got shaken up, as Dubrick (who dropped a chain) and Amberger slid back to Kurt McDonald and Wilhelm Hirsch. Margirier, meanwhile, rode his way up into the front pack to make it an 8 man deep lead group. Those 8 men kept their 20 second gap to Dubrick’s group. Next on the road was Høgenhaug’s group, 1:19 down from the lead, and that group had Barnaby, Stepniak, and Ben Hamilton in it.

During the next 10 kilometers, there was a lot of shuffling around in the front pack; first Margirier leapfrogged to the front, then followed by Bergère coming to the front. The hard pace saw the 8 leading men become 7, as Nieschlag started to drop backwards. But the hard pace had opened the lead up to 1:13 over Dubrick’s group. They were about to be swallowed from behind, as Ruben Zepuntke and Høgenhaug brought their group to within 10 seconds of the Dubrick chase. Further back, Currie was in danger of losing the back of the group at 2 minutes from the lead. And West was riding solo, almost 2:50 behind.

Approaching the halfway mark of the bike and the lead group started to see some relentless attacks against one another. The attacks had let Nieschlag back onto the group. Bogen was the athlete most in danger of being dropped now. Those attacks, though, had kept Høgenhaug’s group from making inroads, leaving them hovering around 90 seconds behind. Høgenhaug had 8 fellow riders with him: Zepuntke, McDonald, Dubrick, Hirsch, Barnaby, Stepniak, Thomas Bishop, Harry Palmer, and Amberger.

As the race started to turn back towards Taupō, the lead pack of 8 remained. The elastic at times appeared to be in danger of stretching or snapping for Smith, Schoeman, or Bogen, but each time they managed to claw their way back on. Høgenhaug’s group remained 1:27 down, but their hot pace had spit Amberger out the back. Amberger was 20 seconds ahead of Phillips and Hamilton.

With a third of the ride left, Bogen came to the front of the leading group, sharing the workload with Wilde, Margirier, and Bergère. The front group was just starting to pull away from Høgenhaug, extending their lead out to over 90 seconds for the first time. That second group was also seeing some elasticity in it, as Stepniak and McDonald were running the risk of being dropped from that chase. Amberger had indeed dropped to the Phillips group, which also had Currie in it.

On the approach to Heartbreak Hill, the front pack dynamics appeared to be taking a toll on Schoeman and Nieschlag, as they were seeing gaps open that would need to be closed with sizable efforts. The effort list had seen the gap grow to the chase pack, led by Høgenhaug, now standing at 2:04. That second pack still held the likes of Dubrick, Barnaby, Zepuntke, and Palmer.

Going over the top of Heartbreak Hill and there were multiple attacks amongst the front group, but none of them quite stuck. Bogen also received a talking to by an official; no card was shown on screen, but it appeared to be a warning of some type. That ongoing effort was paying dividends on the chasers, though; Høgenhaug and his group was now over 2.5 minutes back. It looked like the podium would emerge from the front pack, and Barnaby would seal his victory in the IM Pro Series.

On the descent into town and Margirier managed to slip away from the rest of the lead pack, but it was all to try to build a gap as he had to serve a penalty. Wilde wound up the first into T2 after a 1:58:51 bike split as he gapped out the field in the descent, followed by Bogen, Geens, Bergère, and Smith. Next came Nieschlag, the last athlete within 28 seconds. Schoeman was next, 1:19 down. Zepuntke led the chase at 3:38, followed by Palmer, Barnaby, Stepniak, Hirsch, Bishop, Dubrick, McDonald, and Høgenhaug.

Wilde blasted out of transition, opening a 100 yard gap in his early strides. Geens had moved up to second place, 21 seconds off the pace. Smith was another 8 seconds back in third, followed by Bergère in fourth, 45 seconds from Wilde. Nieschlag held fifth, and Bogen was going the wrong way, the slowest of the lead pack riders, in sixth and losing time to the chasing Schoeman. At the quarter way mark and Bergère made his move past Smith for third on the road; the top four men were just 90 seconds apart from one another. Bogen had also managed to catch Nieschlag and pass him for fifth, and maintaining a minute gap to Schoeman.

At 8 kilometers it looked like this would be a two horse race for the win: Wilde held a steady 45 second lead on Geens, and they were matching pace with one another. Bergère was third, just under a minute behind Geens, but not matching the leading pair on pace. Smith was tightening his grasp on fourth; though Bergère had dropped him, he was also keeping the likes of Bogen, Nieschlag, and Schoeman at bay. Dubrick, Barnaby, and Palmer closed out the top 10, and nobody behind appeared to be closing up.

Halfway through the run and Wilde had split 34:31; it wasn’t quite the 1:05 half marathon pace he was seeking but it was indeed faster than anyone else on the road. Geens was 55 seconds behind, followed by Bergère at 2:11 down. Smith sat in fourth, 3:24 from Wilde, and with a 25 second gap to fifth placed Bogen. Nieschlag kept firm grasp on sixth and ready to pounce if either Smith or Bogen faltered. Schoeman was 7th, 4:52 from the lead, 42 seconds behind sixth. He had a healthy 1:20 gap over 8th placed Dubrick, with Palmer and Barnaby in 9th and 10th. Those two had a little to worry about, as within a minute of them was Bishop, Hirsch, and Stepniak.

With 5 kilometers left to run, Wilde’s lead had been cut to 45 seconds. Assuming that paces held, Geens would have Wilde in sight for a sprint finish. But Wilde faltered in the 16th kilometer, with the lead cut down to just 25 seconds. With the 17th kilometer, Geens closed further. And in kilometer 18 the pass was made. Wilde, with a grimace on his face, could do nothing as Geens blasted past him. Further back, Bogen continued to slide backwards, passed now by Schoeman for sixth.

Geens closed out the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships, running 1:07:34 to victory. Wilde, fading hard during the second half of the run, still held onto second. Bergère came third, earning another bronze medal this year. Hometown hero Smith held onto fourth, edging Nieschlag for it. Barnaby finished down in 9th, but claimed the IRONMAN Pro Series title in the process.

Top 15 Results

1. Jelle Geens 3:32:09
2. Hayden Wilde 3:33:22
3. Léo Bergère 3:35:08
4. Kyle Smith 3:37:51
5. Justus Nieschlag 3:38:06
6. Henri Schoeman 3:39:20
7. Rico Bogen 3:39:36
8. Harry Palmer 3:39:42
9. Gregory Barnaby 3:40:14
10. Marc Dubrick 3:40:27
11. Wilhelm Hirsch 3:41:27
12. Thomas Bishop 3:42:01
13. Kacper Stepaniak 3:42:26
14. Braden Currie 3:44:28
15. Matt Hanson 3:44:47

The post Jelle Geens Runs His Way to 70.3 World Title first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

Taylor Knibb successfully defended her IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship, using her bike prowess to build an insurmountable lead over the field. Knibb held nearly five minutes in hand coming off of the bike over Imogen Simmonds and Kat Matthews. Matthews tried desperately to claw her way back up to Knibb, running nearly a full four minutes faster than Knibb, but it was too little, too late.

For Matthews, though, second was a strong consolation, as it also consolidated her victory in the inaugural IRONMAN Pro Series.

Ashleigh Gentle took third with a well-balanced performance, riding in the primary chase pack and emerging from it to chase down Simmonds and Julie Derron.

Knibb, recounting her day, said, “Well, I think I dragged the whole women’s pack off the course during the swim. For the bike course you had no information, so I think I overrode a little bit. And then on the run course, there was everyone! This is an impressive community and I want to thank everyone.”

“I think it is really cool that for the 70.3 World Championships they have been very different courses and on different continents. It reminds me why I love IRONMAN races.”

For Matthews, she was happy with her second second place finish in world championship events this year. “I’m really proud. I can’t believe how well Taylor has done again. The whole women’s field really pulled it off. To come second in both, I’m over the moon.” Speaking on what it would take to win, she said “Cleary it is the bike that I need to commit to; I had a great time riding with Imogen Simmonds all day and we still lost time to Taylor.”

Gentle was reflective, saying “I guess I was a little bit down coming out of the water, and did the first part of the bike like it was the only part of the race and I soon had some regrets. I had to burn some matches. It was a really tough day out there but thankfully I found my rhythm on the run. For me, this race was five years in the making and it was really great.”

As the Race Unfolded

Race day in Taupō dawned with nearly perfect weather for a race: 66 degree water, and upper 50s air temperature. That made for a wetsuit legal swim, which was beneficial given that the water was slightly choppier than it has been all week. The race here is a beach start, which made for plenty of space. Lotte Wilms lined up apart from the rest of the pre-race favorites, versus Taylor Knibb right with all the other highlight swim caps on the inside line towards the first turn buoy, a 90 degree left hand turn.

A frantic initial swim with the wide beach start; three columns of women developed, with the athletes on the left-hand side gaining the lead, led by Taylor Knibb and Sara Perez Sala. On the right hand side, Imogen Simmonds and Julie Derron took out the pack hard. At the first turn buoy it all came back together, in a single pack, with all the pre-race favorites in that main group.

Knibb’s pace on the front was such that the elastic was starting to snap to athletes like Kat Matthews and Ashleigh Gentle. The current was quite strong, as the lead pack swam well inside the sight buoy line. At roughly 800 meters, the elastic snapped, with a 4 woman lead group breaking away. Wilms, Rebecca Clarke, Knibb, Perez Sala. The second pack consisted of roughly 15 women, which had Ashleigh Gentle, Kat Matthews, and Paula Findlay in it.

After another 600 meters, though, the groups came back together, led by a charge from Jodie Stimpson. As the race headed for shore, and into more current, the groups spread into long lines of single swimmers. Sara Perez Sala took swim honors in 24:20. Also there were Wilms, Clarke, Marta Sanchez, Knibb, Imogen Simmonds, Caroline Pohle, Julie Derron, Hanne De Vet, and Jodie Stimpson. All also within a minute of the lead were Hannah Berry, Kat Matthews, Ashleigh Gentle, and Paula Findlay. Further back were Ellie Salthouse (+1:26), Maja Stage Nielsen (+1:55), and IRONMAN Pro Series leader Jackie Hering (+2:07).

18 women started the bike within 1:02 of one another, led by Perez Sala. But within five minutes of the bike starting, Knibb accelerated her way past Perez Sala to take the lead. By 8 kilometers into the bike, Knibb had blitzed her way to a 42 second lead, with Simmonds closing up toward Perez Sala. Gentle led the primary chase group, just under a minute behind from Knibb, joined by Sanchez, Derron, Wilms, and Pohle. Another 10 seconds back were Matthews, Findlay, Clarke and Stimpson.

As the course started moving back uphill, Matthews began charging her way through the chase pack, passing by everyone to climb into second place. Findlay was also a strong mover on the climb, ripping past Sanchez and with the Perez Sala in her sights. The fireworks behind, though, had given Knibb the space to extend her lead to 1:25 over Simmonds, Matthews, and Findlay. That chase trio was starting to put space between them and Sanchez, Perez Sala, Derron, Gentle, and Poole. Wilms led the third chase group in 10th place, but now was more than two minutes behind.

Over the next 10 kilometers and Knibb continued to ride away from everyone, extending her lead out to a full 90 seconds over Simmonds and Matthews, who had left Findlay behind. Findlay was 30 seconds from Simmonds and Matthews, and riding with Sanchez and Perez Sala. Derron led the next group on the road, 2:28 down from Knibb, and that had Pohle, Gentle, and Hanne De Vet in it. Wilms was barely hanging onto the back of De Vet, with Hannah Berry and Clarke the next women on the road but over 1:20 from Wilms.

Approaching the halfway mark of the bike and Knibb added another 10 seconds to her lead on Simmons and Matthews. The Findlay group had ceded even more time, now over 1:10 behind Simmonds and Matthews and 2:53 from Knibb; shortly after the time split, Derron pulled her group up into the chase. So now all together were Findlay, Derron, Sanchez, Perez Sala, Pohle, Gentle, Wilms, and De Vet. 

As the return leg of the bike course began, Knibb brought her lead out to over two minutes on Simmonds and Matthews. Derron and Wilms took control of the chase pack, 3:38 from Knibb. Missing from the group was Perez Sala, who received a blue card for a position foul and served it. Also receiving a penalty was Sanchez. The rest of the names all remained the same, and they were the last riders on the road within four minutes of Knibb. Further back, Laura Madsen led a five woman group that included Berry, Salthouse, Lisa Becharas, and Grace Thek.

With 30 kilometers left to ride, Knibb padded her lead to 2:25. Simmonds and Matthews continued to legally work together, keeping the chase group well away. In fact, they themselves now had a 2:30 lead on the chase, led by Derron. Sanchez had yet to serve her position foul penalty and sat fifth on the road. That chase group had even ceded time to Madsen’s group, which was just a minute from the back of the pack. Perez Sala, who had served her penalty, had fallen all the way to 26th place, in between Tamara Jewett and Jackie Hering, 10 minutes behind Knibb.

Cresting the top of Heartbreak Hill and with just under 10 kilometers left to ride, Knibb extended her lead out to almost 4.5 minutes. Matthews and Simmonds had 3:10 in hand on the now 10 woman chase group, led by Findlay and containing Madsen, Derron, Gentle, Wilms, Pohle, Becharas, De Vet, Sanchez, and Berry. Salthouse came next on the road, another 50 seconds back and the last woman within 10 minutes of Knibb. Nikki Bartlett held 15th, riding solo in front of Grace Thek.

Knibb flew into transition after a 2:10:09 bike, 4:39 in front of Simmonds. Matthews came next, another 13 seconds back. Derron came in 4th, 8:06 down, leading the group of Pohle, De Vet, Findlay, Gentle, Madsen, Becharas, Wilms, and Berry. Ellie Salthouse had moved into 13th, 10:01 down. Bartlett and Thek rounded out the top 15.

In the opening kilometers and Matthews went on a charge, quickly dropping Simmonds and running 10 seconds per kilometer faster than the leader, Knibb. Simmonds was now a full five minutes behind. Derron held fourth and was matching the pace of Knibb, but that was good enough to pull away from Gentle and Findlay. De Vet, Pohle, Madsen, and Berry came next, with healthy gaps to Becharas and Wilms.

A quarter of the run done and Knibb’s lead had been trimmed to 4:24 over Matthews; still, a comfortable margin if their run paces held. Simmonds was losing time, 1:25 behind Matthews and just two minutes ahead of Derron. Gentle had found her running legs and sat 5th, 23 seconds from Derron and matching the pace in front. Findlay had also opened up a small gap in fifth; she was a minute behind Gentle, but 25 seconds in front of Pohle, the last woman within 10 minutes of the front of the race. Madsen, Berry, and De Vet closed out the top 10 runners at this stage of the race.

Over the next few kilometers and Knibb continued to cede time to Matthews. As they came into town, Matthews chewed a full minute out of Knibb’s lead, now just 3:17 at the halfway mark. Projecting that pace out through the finish, Knibb would hold onto the win by just over a minute. Simmonds continued to hold onto third, roughly 3 minutes behind Matthews. But Derron was coming, now trailing Simmonds by 46 seconds. Gentle held fifth, 7:19 from the lead. Findlay was holding onto sixth, 2:07 from Gentle. Findlay had a 28 second gap over 7th placed Pohle. Salthouse had put in a healthy move, moving all the way up to 8th. Madsen had 9th, and Berry 10th. 

Lots of movement over the next few kilometers: namely, Gentle blasted past both Simmonds and Derron to move her way onto the podium. At the front of the race, Matthews had gained another 40 seconds, pulling the lead down to 2:35 with 6K left to run. Looking further back, and one to watch was Thek: she was outrunning the likes of Madsen and Berry in front of her, with the potential to move into the top 10 by the end.

Matthews continued her relentless charge towards the front. With 3.5 kilometers left, Knibb’s lead was cut to 2:19, and with just under 2 kilometers left, it was under 2 minutes. But it looked like Matthews would run out of real estate. Gentle had opened up a 45 second gap in third over Simmonds. Simmonds, to her credit, had dropped Derron. Findlay appeared to have a comfortable grasp on sixth. Pohle and Salthouse were about to be in a battle for 7th place. Thek had moved into 9th, while Tamara Jewett had moved herself up into 10th, now the fastest runner on the road. 

Taylor Knibb crossed the finish line in 3:57:34 to defend her IRONMAN 70.3 title. Matthews took second and the IRONMAN Pro Series title, just 1:15 behind after a 1:15:34 half marathon. Ashleigh Gentle took third place.

Top 15 Results

1. Taylor Knibb 3:57:34
2. Kat Matthews 3:58:49
3. Ashleigh Gentle 4:03:01
4. Imogen Simmonds 4:05:12
5. Julie Derron 4:06:02
6. Paula Findlay 4:07:12
7. Ellie Salthouse 4:07:48
8. Caroline Pohle 4:08:06
9. Tamara Jewett 4:08:47
10. Grace Thek 4:09:08
11. Nikki Bartlett 4:09:53
12. Laura Madsen 4:10:01
13. Solveig Løvseth 4:10:40
14. Hannah Berry 4:10:52
15. Hanne De Vet 4:12:53

All Photos: Kevin Mackinnon / Slowtwitch

The post Taylor Knibb Three-Peats, Wins IM 70.3 Worlds first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

We are just hours away from the kick-off of the 2024 IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships in Taupō, New Zealand. The nervous excitement for the event permeates through us all, whether or not we are racing. And there’s more than ever at stake here this year, as 70.3 Worlds will mark the conclusion of the inaugural IRONMAN Pro Series. There’s an awful lot on the line.

With that in mind, our two senior editors — Kevin Mackinnon and I — have put some thought into it. Here’s what we think we will see happen this weekend.

The Women’s Race

Kevin: It’s hard to imagine there’s a more prohibitive favorite for Saturday’s women’s race than Taylor Knibb. The two-time defending champion is coming off a stellar year. Last year’s runner-up, Kat Matthews, should certainly be the one to watch for another podium finish and a move to the top of the IRONMAN Pro Series standings, even though its hard to imagine how she’s still in one piece after the tough schedule she’s had this year. Any sign of faltering from Knibb or Matthews, especially on the run, will open the door for the speedy run capabilities of Julie Derron and Ashleigh Gentle, or the sheer consistency of last year’s bronze medalist, Imogen Simmonds.

Ryan: On paper, this should be Knibb’s race to win — the two-time defending champion has dominated middle distance and with this course, it should have her name written all over it. But I also find it interesting that Knibb has mentioned in nearly every single interview this week that she’s been battling either an illness or allergies when outdoors in Taupō. I don’t think she’s playing games with it; she’s always straight-forward in her interviews. But that throws a wrinkle into the mix that could open the door of opportunity.

So strike me as someone who thinks that Ashleigh Gentle will be able to defeat Knibb for the first time in a couple of years at this distance. Knibb battles valiantly for second place. And Kat Matthews will take home the IRONMAN Pro Series with a third-place finish here, beating out a fast-closing Julie Derron for it.

The Men’s Race

Kevin: The men’s race is shaping up to be a barn burner. Look for a World Triathlon Championship Series-style lead pack out of the water as the Olympians and speedy swimmers push the pace from the sound of the horn.

Local heroes Hayden Wilde and Kyle Smith will be enjoying the adrenaline rush of what is expected to be an immense crowd of Kiwi supporters, but don’t expect that to affect Jelle Geens or Léo Bergère in the slightest. Defending champ Rico Bogen will no-doubt swim and bike with the leaders, but hanging with this calibre run crowd is going to be a stretch. If Wilde runs the 65-minute half-marathon he believes he’s capable of, there won’t be any touching him. But there will be a few folks in that lead bunch who will do everything they can to ensure his legs are whipped by the time he gets off the bike. 

Ryan: My prediction? Pain.

This has all the makings of a 1970s heavyweight boxing title fight. It’s going to be a war of attrition. Expect drama from the opening cannon, battles back and forth, and a huge surprise in the closing kilometers.

That, in my mind, makes this a race by those with the most WTCS experience; they’re used to spending hours attacking and attacking on the bike, over and over again, while still having the legs to run extremely fast once the hit T2. And who better than home country hero Hayden Wilde to take the win based on those strengths? I think it’s a battle between Wilde and Léo Bergère for the win. But, just like in Paris, Wilde holds him off. For the third spot, I think it goes to the defending champion Rico Bogen; his recent run time from T100 Dubai would see him run a just under 1:09 half marathon. I think that’s probably fast enough to get the job done.

As for the IM Pro Series: my money is on Gregory Barnaby to hold off Matthew Marquardt.

The racing begins later today. Live coverage can be found in the U.S. and Canada on Outside Watch, or globally on DAZN or at proseries.ironman.com.

The post Our Senior Editors Make Their 70.3 Worlds Predictions first appeared on Slowtwitch News.

Matthew Marquardt at the pre-race press conference in Taupo. Photo: Kevin Mackinnon

Leave it to an Ohio State medical student to have all the numbers dialled in. At Thursday’s press conference here in Taupo for the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship, Matthew Marquardt explained exactly how the winner of the IRONMAN Pro Series will be decided at Sunday’s race. If he and Gregory Barnaby are both within 8:43 of the winner, whoever crosses the line first will take the US$200,000 first prize. If they are both more than 8:43 behind the winner, Barnaby will remain in first place in the overall standings.

All of which sets up an extremely exciting “race within a race” on Sunday for the 27-year-old, who somehow manages to balance life as a pro triathlete with his studies at The Ohio State University College of Medicine and research at the OSU James Comprehensive Cancer Center.

While Barnaby padded his chances with an extra 70.3 race in Western Australia (which he won), Marquardt skipped that race in order to spend time with family for Thanksgiving.

“The Pro series is a big reason why I came to this race,” Marquardt said in an interview after Thursday’s press conference here in Taupo. “I start clinical rotations in about three weeks, and that’ll be a huge shift for me in terms of how I balance my time with school and with training. So, I originally did not want to come to this race because it’s so late in the season, but with how the Pro Series was shaping up, it was very clear that it was going to be a necessary thing to do in order to compete for the title. It literally is going to come down to a winner take all scenario. Hopefully that will make very exciting viewing for everyone else, because there’s really, especially for the men, two races going on. There’s the race for the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship, and then there’s the race between me and Gregory.”

In June I wasn’t the only person at the IRONMAN 70.3 Mont-Tremblant press conference who was surprised to learn that Marquardt had never done a professional 70.3 race before. (He would eventually finish third.) Marquardt had competed over the distance during his short, but impressive age-group career, which included winning his age group in Kona in 2022, then taking third in his age group at the 70.3 worlds in St. George a few weeks later. He would then turn pro, and focussed on full-distance races during his rookie year in 2023, which included podium finishes at IRONMAN Texas (third) and IRONMAN Coeur d’Alene (second) before finishing 11th in Nice and third again at IRONMAN Florida.

So why all the fulls?

“I think, based on how my metabolism works and everything, the longer distance is what suits me best, which is why we focused on that,” he said. “But, with the Pro Series, we obviously needed to put together some 70.3s as well. So, I think there’s a lot of unknowns exactly how it’ll play out. I did well at Mont-Tremblant racing against Lionel (Sanders), which was definitely a really good learning experience, which provides some confidence. I know what I can do in training and hopefully that’ll translate into the race and I’ll put together a good showing.”   

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