Starting the 2024-season with a race where you lead from start to finish: it’s a wonderful scenario and, for Spain’s Marta Sanchez, nothing but the reality. She just impressively won Ironman 70.3 Pucon.
In Chile, she didn’t have women around her for long; only during the swim leg. After 27:38 minutes, Sanchez came out of the water and by then she was already in the lead, although Chilean Catalina Salazar was still near her at that time. On the bike, however, that changed completely and Sanchez’s lead got bigger and bigger.
Sanchez’s lead even got so big that by T2 it had increased to over nine minutes. Sanchez could not fail to win anymore, although there was still 21 kilometers to run. In that run, the Spanish winner certainly did not recorded the fastest time and her lead diminished somewhat, but logically the victory was no longer in danger.
Sanchez won the race in 4:19:18. Elizabeth Bravo finished second in 4:26:07 and Barbara Riveros third in 4:27:48.
