The differences were small and the decision only fell in the final kilometers, but Vincent Luis has just won Ironman 70.3 Bahrain. The Frenchman thus takes his second title in Bahrain, as he also won the race two years ago.
After the swim it was Vincent Luis who – thanks to a swim time of 22:36 minutes – immediately was the first to head for T1, but Johannes Vogel followed at three seconds and also Henri Schoeman was right behind. Wilhelm Hirsch followed at seventeen seconds, while Maciek Bruzdziak, Jannik Schaufler and Kacper Stepniak also ran to T1 within forty seconds. Mathis Margirier, who would directly ride to the front of the race on the bike, followed in eighth place at 1:19 minutes.
Already after 30 kilometers, Margirier had taken over the lead in the race and a leading group including, in addition to the Frenchman, Hirsch, Luis, Schoeman, Schaufler, Bruzdziak, Stepniak and Johannes Vogel had formed. This situation remained unchanged for a long time, but in the closing stages Margirier and Hirsch managed to break away from the leading group and in T2 the two men had even built up a lead of one and a half minutes over their first pursuers.
During the half marathon, Margirier and Hirsch were evenly matched – although Hirsch was always running a few seconds behind – but in the meantime it was Luis who started to make up time. The Frenchman, who of course can rely on his high speed from the Short Distance, made up time every kilometer and after fifteen kilometers the situation arose that Margirier was still in the lead, but was followed by Luis, who had thus advanced to second place, at only thirteen seconds. At 24 seconds Hirsch followed, who also still had a chance to win. Not much later Luis took over the lead and Margirier tried to stick with him.
That worked, but it proved not enough to keep Luis from victory. The Frenchman won in a time of 3:32:16, fourteen seconds ahead of Margirier (3:32:31). Hirsch finished third in 3:33:18.
