Eight World Champions Set to Race Ironman Texas

One glance at the newly-released start list for Ironman Texas – the North American Championship set for April 18th in the Woodlands – and, as @ironmemes_140.6 noted, you might mistake it for a world championship field.

If there’s one regular-season race worth carving out time in your weekend to watch, it’s this one.

With eight World Champions set to toe the line (two on the women’s side, six on the men’s), this race is set to deliver some of the highest-profile matchups in the sport.

Men’s Race

The men’s field brings together the Norwegian trio of Kristian Blummenfelt, Casper Stornes, and Gustav Iden once again, alongside three-time Ironman World Champion (and two-time Ironman Texas champion) Patrick Lange. Reigning 70.3 World Champion Jelle Geens will make his Ironman debut after stating his ambition to contend for the win in Kona this year, while 2024 T100 World Champion Marten Van Riel is also set to toe the line.

Joining those six world champions is Jonas Schomburg, who has consistently been at the pointy end of world championship fields and is coming off an outstanding performance in Oceanside, where he finished just 24 seconds behind Blummenfelt in second place, in a race where nine men broke the previous course record.

“Yo Yo Yo” Sam Long returns after a gutsy performance in Oceanside, where he nearly took the win against the deepest field that race has ever seen. He’s joined by Magnus Ditlev, opening his season in Texas after a slightly delayed start due to a minor running injury, and fan favourite Lionel Sanders, who will take on his first full-distance event since 2024 after racing only 70.3s in 2025 while managing a sacral stress fracture.

If pressed on a prediction, the honest answer is that this race may not be decided until deep into the closing stages of the marathon. Blummenfelt arrives with remarkable momentum, having run his way to the front in both Geelong and Oceanside – but notably, those decisive moments came late (midway through the run in Geelong, and not until kilometre 18 in Oceanside). If there’s one lesson with Blummenfelt, though, it’s to never rule him out.

While he currently appears to have the edge over compatriots Stornes and Iden based on Oceanside, how he stacks up against Lange, Geens, Van Riel, and Ditlev over the full distance remains an open question. And it’s worth noting, he only edged Schomburg by 24 seconds last time.

In a field this deep, the margin for error is effectively zero.

Women’s Race

On the women’s side, defending champion Kat Matthews returns, not only as last year’s winner in Texas, but as the athlete who set a new Ironman world record of 8:10:34 on this course (later surpassed by Laura Philipp in Hamburg with a time of 8:03:13). She’ll be challenged by last year’s runner-up and four-time world champion Taylor Knibb, along with reigning Ironman World Champion Solveig Lovseth.

If pressed, Matthews stands out as the most consistent performer across the full distance. But Knibb may represent the greatest threat, following her near-victory in Kona last year, where she led deep into the marathon before collapsing in the closing miles. Lovseth, meanwhile, has already shown she can win on the sport’s biggest stages, and cannot be overlooked in a field like this.

Beyond the headline trio, the depth continues with a strong group of contenders including Hannah Berry, Lisa Perterer, Sara Svensk, Marta Sanchez, Jackie Hering, Danielle Lewis, Grace Thek, and India Lee.

On both the men’s and women’s sides, this is about as close as a regular-season race gets to a world championship test.