Kat Matthews really seems to be back to her old level as she was unprecedentedly strong today at Ironman Vitoria-Gasteiz. In the men’s race, the win went to Spaniard Antonio Benito López, although some commotion preceded it.
Benito López was not to blame for the commotion, since it had everything to do with Sam Laidlow. The current IM World Champion, who had returned to the start line in a long time, was penalized first for not hanging up his blue bag correctly in the transition area and then for a mistake during the bike ride. However, because he did not serve that penalty immediately in the first penalty box, he was disqualified. Laidlow did complete the race so that he could file a protest afterwards and ended up crossing the finish line in second place, but as of yet his protest was not vindicated and thus he got removed from the results list.
The men’s race was characterized by big differences anyway, and when Benito López started the run, it did not immediately look like he would win the race: he had Robert Kallin, Kristian Hogenhaug, Mathias Petersen and Cameron Wurf ahead of him at the time, and his gap was over thirteen minutes. Still, he did not let himself be fooled and started running at a stunning pace. Even before the 30-kilometer mark, he had caught up with everyone and thus took over the lead in the race. In the end, the Spaniard ran a marathon in 2:37:57 and won the race in 7:36:38. David McNamee finished second in 7:41:20 and Wurf third in 7:43:16.
Kat Matthews dominating
In the women’s race, Matthews was strong from the start: Stephanie Clutterbuck may have had a lead of nearly 4:30 minutes after the swim, but Matthews immediately followed in the chasing group and then saw herself surrounded by big favorites like Ruth Astle, Els Visser and Daniela Bleymehl.
So for Matthews, that meant a nice position on the bike, because these were also immediately the women with whom she clumped on the bike and began the pursuit of the leading athlete. Given the five-minute lead that Clutterbuck had, that chase did take some time, but it was actually clear pretty quickly that the British athlete would be overtaken. That eventually happened just after the hundred kilometer mark and because Clutterbuck did manage to catch up then, a leading group of five women was formed at that point.
In the final kilometers of the bike leg, however, a small shuffle was made and it was somewhat striking that Visser, who already finished third at Challenge Roth last week, lost the connection. Astle entered T2 first, immediately followed by Matthews. Bleymehl then followed at 49 seconds and Visser returned to T2 fourth, trailing by 1:05 minute. Clutterbuck had already dropped to over three minutes behind at that point, but was still fifth.
During the marathon, Matthews immediately ran to the lead position and that would not change during the run. Visser in turn needed little time to catch up with Bleymehl and Astle also had to acknowledge the supremacy of Visser after fifteen kilometers. This directly sealed the position of Visser, who ran very steady to the finish and only lost considerable time in the very last kilometers.
Matthews won the race in 8:24:23. Visser finished second in 8:32:29 and Astle ended up third in 8:38:07.
