IM South Africa 2012 – Analyzing Results

Race Conditions

This year’s IM South Africa was very slow. The adjustment was calculated at –5:49, so it was about 18 minutes slower than the 2011 race. I’m not sure what factors contributed to this, I have not heard horror stories of strong winds or too long swim courses, but the times were pretty slow even starting with the swim. (Please note that the adjustment is not influenced by the strength of the field, only by comparing expected and actual finishing times by each athlete.)

Male Results

Some of the pre race favorites didn’t start (Cunama) or made clear that they were just racing for fun (Tissink). The remaining favorite, Andi Böcherer, led after the bike, but dropped out at the 18k mark of the run, and Clemente Alonso won his first Ironman:

Rank	Name	Nation	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Clemente Alonso-McKernan	ESP	08:34:45	08:51:24
2	Cyril Viennot	FRA	08:41:48	08:48:58
3	Mike Aigroz	SWI	08:46:04	08:51:31
4	Markus Fachbach	GER	08:57:21	08:51:43
5	Trevor Delsaut	FRA	09:03:03	09:09:30
6	Petr Vabrousek	CZE	09:09:57	09:02:56
7	Craig Twigg	GBR	09:10:48	09:58:24
8	Sylvain Rota	FRA	09:11:24	n/a
9	Kent Horner	ZAF	09:14:39	09:24:02
10	Guilherme Manocchio	BRA	09:20:56	08:49:15
11	Andrey Lyatskiy	RUS	09:25:43	09:13:07
12	Michael Wetzel	GER	09:26:33	09:21:59
13	Raynard Tissink	ZAF	09:31:42	08:39:14
14	Ivan Albano	BRA	09:40:30	09:26:11
15	Georg Swoboda	AUT	09:42:51	08:56:35

As usual, a TOP 3 finish required to race faster than your predicted time and deliver a good performance – not much of a chance anymore to just show up, go through the motions and finish on the podium.

Female Results

On the women’s side, Natascha Badmann had a bad swim but a great bike and run and managed to overtake her countrywomen Simone Braendli for her fourth win in South Africa:

Rank	Name	Nation	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Natascha Badmann	SWI	09:47:10	09:39:30
2	Simone Braendli	SWI	09:52:26	10:19:01
3	Diana Riesler	GER	10:01:14	09:46:31
4	Dianne Mcewan	ZAF	10:07:55	n/a
5	Susan Dietrich	GER	10:08:02	09:47:28
6	Virginia Berasategui	ESP	10:13:00	09:44:23
7	Emi Sakai	JPN	10:28:03	n/a
8	Anne Basso	FRA	10:33:12	10:32:12
9	Nina Pekerman	ISR	10:34:24	n/a
10	Jacqui Gordon	USA	10:41:13	10:17:28
11	Claire Horner	ZAF	10:50:53	10:46:25
12	Kathrin Walther	GER	11:30:13	n/a
13	Caroline Koll	ZAF	11:56:21	10:52:04

Congratulations to Natscha – even with her having the best pre-race rating, I didn’t think she had another IM win in her. By winning, she became the oldest female winner of an Ironman at 45 years, 4 months and 16 days. Previously, Fernanda Keller had that record with her win in IM Brazil 2008 at the age of 44 years, 7 months and 21 days. I wish I was that fast!