Rudy Von Berg takes three-way sprint to win Ironman Americas Championship
Top three finish within 21 seconds of each other.
Photo by: IronmanLiveAmerican Rudy Von Berg pulled out a final-mile sprint to get to the line just 13 seconds ahead of Poland’s Robert Wilkowiecki and 21 seconds ahead of countryman Matthew Marquardt and take the win at Ironman Texas, the Americas Championship.
The three came out of the water within 10 seconds of swim leader Andrew Horsfall-Turner (GBR), and stayed clear of the rest of the field through most of the bike. Pre-race favourites Matt Hansen and Joe Skipper would fade out of the picture on the bike – Hansen is reported to have crashed early in the bike, while Skipper appeared to be in contention before going off course in the last 15 km, and then dropped out early in the run.
Von Berg pushed the pace towards the end of the bike, hitting T2 23 seconds ahead of Wilkowiecki, and 2:48 up on Marquardt, who has just turned pro this year after finishing as the top age group athlete in Kona last year.
At the 30 km point of the run Wilkowiecki started to press the pace, and by 38 km had a 30 second lead on Von Berg, with Marquardt a minute down. With just over 1 km to go the lead was down to eight seconds on Von Berg and 13 seconds on Marquardt. Von berg managed to surge into the lead to take the win in 7:44:51, with Wilkowiecki crossing in 7:45:04 and Marquardt rounding out the podium in 7:45:12. France’s Arnaud Guilloux took fourth (7:54:21) with Canadian Cody Beals rounding out the top-five in 7:57:18.
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