The Ironman World Championship in Nice turned out to be a real battlefield, but one woman prevailed: Laura Philipp was so incredibly strong that she made everyone crack and gave no one a chance to keep her from her first world title.
At the finish line there was more than 45 minutes between the top ten women, which says more than enough about the toughness of the race. In any case, there was a wonderful battle, which began right away in the water. Quite early on, mainly thanks to a high pace from Spain’s Marta Sanchez, a nice leading group formed, including Fenella Langridge, Rebecca Clarke, Lauren Brandon, Rachel Zilinskas, Hannah Berry and Lotte Wilms.
Remarkably, a very strong swimming Anne Haug also stayed among the fastest women for the first 1900 meters, but she had to leave a gap during the second half of the swim. Once in T1, Kat Matthews, Julie Iemmolo, Marjolaine Pierré and Chelsea Sodaro also appeared to be near the leading group. These women were all within 45 seconds of each other, but after that the differences were huge. India Lee, for example, was three minutes behind, while Anne Haug and Laura Philipp came out of the water in fourteenth and seventeenth, eventually trailing the leaders by four minutes.
Anne Haug DNF
On the bike, it was then Marjolaine Pierré who went on the attack: the French top athlete, only 24 years old, rode incredibly strong in front of her home crowd and saw her lead increase to 2:37 minutes over Matthews, Sanchez, Langridge, Brandon, Berry and Clarke in the first thirty kilometers, which involved a lot of climbing. Sodaro and Julie Iemmolo followed at just over four minutes, while Wilms dropped back a bit further, followed her own plan and came through in tenth at 5:08 minutes behind. Biggest absentee was Anne Haug, who had a flat tire in the very first kilometers of cycling, didn’t get her tire fixed and dropped out.
In the kilometers that followed, Pierré’s lead continued to grow, while all sorts of things happened behind her. Most notable, however, was the huge catch-up that Philipp made, because after 53 kilometers she was only 3:23 minutes behind the leader and thus in third position. Not much later, she would also overtake Matthews, take over second place and ride to the front of the race.
Philipp and Matthews steal the show
Halfway through the bike leg – and with the toughest kilometers done – Philipp, Pierré and Matthews led by three, having come together moments before. At the front, Philipp and Matthews alternated regularly, while Pierré just had to let go of her two rivals. A striking detail: Philipp always took the lead during the climbs, while Matthews made the difference in the technical and tricky descents. Still, until T2, the two women never got away from each other anymore.
Thrilling start of the marathon
Philipp and Matthews therefore started the marathon at the same time and had already extended their lead over Pierré to 5:43 minutes by then. Chelsea Sodaro followed fourth in T2 and was looking at a 9:48 minute gap. After Marta Sanchez also entered T2, it was Lotte Wilms who started the marathon in sixth position.
Although most eyes were on the initially tense battle between Philipp and Matthews. For more than ten kilometers they stayed side by side, but that was also the moment Philipp attacked, ran away from Matthews and saw her lead grow. It was about the same time when Sodaro made up her deficit on Pierré and took over third place in the race, making the podium her final shape relatively early in the race.
Final stage proves to be tough battlefield
Still, a lot happened in the closing kilometers; Matthews stopped several times along the course with cramp, Sodaro’s pace dropped drastically, but most impressive was still Philipp who never collapsed anywhere and ran to a spectacular victory. She won the race in 8:45:15. Despite the walk, Kat Matthews cashed in her second place finish in a time of 8:53:20 and Sodaro was third in 9:04:34.
Full top ten:
- Laura Philipp 8:45:15
- Kat Matthews 8:53:20
- Chelsea Sodaro 9:04:38
- Marjolaine Pierré 9:09:34
- Nikki Bartlett 9:15:47
- Marta Sanchez 9:19:08
- Penny Slater 9:21:47
- Lotte Wilms 9:23:28
- Jackie Hering 9:25:09
- Hannah Berry 9:32:13
