May 2012

Race Conditions

The field for IM Australia was pretty small – not much of a surprise with all the attention (and points and money) that IM Melbourne was getting. We had only 9 pro athletes finishing the race. The adjustment was at 9:26 – a quicker race than in the past, but still in line with the last years (new course rating of 4:41, mainly as a result of slower results in the earlier years).

Male Results

Paul Ambrose won the race leading from start to finish, but he faced a strong run by Tim Berkel who managed to make the race a bit more interesting towards the end:

Rank	Name	Nation	Swim	Bike	Run	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Paul Ambrose	GBR	00:46:18	04:31:25	02:57:12	08:17:38	08:45:00
2	Tim Berkel	AUS	00:48:49	04:42:04	02:47:20	08:21:11	08:41:58
3	Jason Shortis	AUS	00:50:28	04:53:51	02:51:57	08:40:02	08:47:26
4	Leon Griffin	AUS	00:48:53	04:48:26	03:15:26	08:55:54	08:53:12
5	Chris Dmitrieff	AUS	00:51:46	05:10:03	03:18:59	09:24:21	09:08:08
6	Dan Brown	PHI	00:56:46	05:42:34	06:44:37	13:29:04	08:48:41

Female Results

The three women came off the bike very close together, and Aussie Michelle Mitchell put in a soli 3:08 marathon to win the race:

Rank	Name	Nation	Swim	Bike	Run	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Michelle Mitchell	AUS	00:51:48	05:29:57	03:08:38	09:34:57	09:32:06
2	Nicole Ward	AUS	00:51:50	05:28:57	03:20:47	09:44:40	09:54:22
3	Hillary Biscay	USA	00:50:40	05:29:13	03:34:04	09:58:19	10:03:55

Race Conditions

The conditions on race were so hard that they resulted in very slow finishing times. In fact they were so slow that my “normal” calculation methods didn’t work. (Usually I only look at athletes within half an hour of their expected finish times to calculate the race adjustment. This time there were only two athletes which would have resulted in an inappropriate adjustment.) After some fiddling around, I ended up with an adjustment of –36:48, meaning that the finishing times were more than half an hour slower compared to a “neutral” course (such as IM Hawaii). This is the lowest number I have ever seen – and it will probably stay that way for quite some time. But as this is the last time that St. George was run as a full Ironman, we will not be able to see if this year’s results were a fluke or typical of the conditions in Utah.

Male Results

On the men’s side, Ben Hoffman won the race on the run:

Rank	Name	Nation	Swim	Bike	Run	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Ben Hoffman	USA	00:52:44	05:10:01	03:01:24	09:07:04	09:25:07
2	Maik Twelsiek	GER	00:52:42	05:10:35	03:18:23	09:25:58	09:17:45
3	Axel Zeebroek	BEL	00:51:22	05:26:52	03:12:53	09:35:33	09:28:58
4	Thomas Gerlach		00:59:19	05:33:54	03:12:14	09:49:00	10:43:39
5	Matthew Sheeks	USA	01:04:09	05:48:41	02:55:37	09:52:03	10:00:58
6	Ernst Moser	AUT	01:04:52	06:45:00	03:16:58	10:04:07	09:43:34
7	Adam O’Meara	CAN	00:58:47	05:51:26	03:13:44	10:08:10	10:15:40
8	Jesse Vondracek	USA	00:58:47	06:06:57	03:20:21	10:29:36	10:10:32
9	Mike Schifferle	SWI	01:04:31	06:30:15	03:13:28	10:54:44	09:47:38
10	Heath Thurston	USA	00:51:18	06:24:25	03:45:13	11:07:34	10:46:54

Maik Twelsiek finished the bike together with Ben Hoffman, but then had to let him go on the run, Chris MacDonald even had to “pull the pin” on the run and DNF’d, leaving the last place on the podium for Axel Zeebroek.

Female Results

On the female side, “MBK” lead the race from wire to wire in a very convincing fashion, almost posting the fastest times on each of the segments:

Rank	Name	Nation	Swim	Bike	Run	Actual Time	Expected Time
1	Meredith Kessler	USA	00:52:42	05:57:14	03:18:23	10:12:59	10:16:41
2	Jessie Donavan	USA	01:18:51	05:55:24	03:18:58	10:37:30	10:18:28
3	Uli Bromme	USA	01:09:10	06:10:21	03:29:40	10:53:20	10:43:21
4	Gillian Clayton		01:34:00	06:20:12	03:15:13	11:15:38	n/a
5	Erin Spitler		01:19:37	06:07:22	03:45:30	11:16:42	11:05:07
6	Erin Young		01:09:11	06:56:04	03:40:01	11:52:35	n/a