In what started as a fairly boring race, but ended in a particularly exciting denouement, Jelle Geens has just become Ironman 70.3 World Champion. The Belgian is thus writing history, because never before has a Belgian stood on the podium of an IM World Championship 70.3, let alone on the highest step. Geens was chasing Hayden Wilde for a long time, but the New Zealand favorite was no match for the apparently flying Belgian athlete in the final kilometers.
The race started surprisingly right away when American Greg Harper took the initiative during the swim and also recorded the fastest swim time with 21:48 minutes. At 12 seconds followed Josh Amberger, Leo Bergere and Marc Dubrick and then it was another 15 seconds until Rico Bogen, Henri Schoeman, Hayden Wilde, Kyle Smith and also Jelle Geens came out of the water. Big names who actually lost time were also there: Gregory Barnaby for example, who was seen as a serious outsider, came out of the water at 1:06 minute and was then fourteenth. Near him, Caleb Noble, Thomas Bishop, Sam Osborne and Braden Currie also came out of the water, while Mathis Margirier lost more than a minute.
On the bike, a leading group of nine men quickly formed and after Marc Dubrick and Josh Amberger lost the connection there and the very strong cycling Margirier just joined in, a leading group of eight men was a fact: Bergere, Wilde, Geens, Bogen, Schoeman, Nieschlag, Smith and so Margirier then rode together and it would stay that way for almost ninety kilometers. Unfortunately there was a lot of drafting and in the end only Margirier – the man who did most of the work on the bike – got a time penalty. He sat it out just before T2 and because of the five-minute penalty he received, his chance of a top classification was gone immediately.
During the run, it was Wilde who flew off immediately and took the initiative. Behind him, Geens and Bergere followed, creating a beautiful joust between no less than three Olympians. Wilde, however, proved to have the strongest legs and managed to grab a one-minute lead over Geens and even two minutes over Bergere in the first ten kilometers. There seemed to be no problem, but a kilometer further into the race the New Zealander’s legs began to squeak and creak, while Geens seemed to have opened up a second barrel of energy.
Second by second, the Belgian began to catch up to Wilde from that point on, which gave Geens visible hope and energy. Every kilometer he won about five seconds and with about five kilometers to go he was even closer to only 15 seconds. Geens stepped up a gear, closed the gap, went for it and gave Wilde no chance to catch up anymore.
A few minutes later, Geens wrote history by winning the race in a time of 3:32:09. Wilde was second in 3:33:22 and Bergere third in 3:35:08.
