Chrissie Wellington had another amazing race in South Africa – this is what most triathlon new sites are reporting. Here’s a closer look at the statistical outcome of this race.
Race Adjustment
IM South Africa is usually a medium quick race (course handicap around 10 minutes), but in the last few years has been a bit faster – not sure what has caused this, but there might have been some course changes before the 2008 race. Compared to these years, the 2011 race was typical with an adjustment of 17:27. (To recap, the adjustment is the average difference between the participant’s ratings and their actual race time.) Conditions have been reported to be quite nice, but maybe a bit hot during the run. This may have contributed to quite a few big names dropping out, for example the pre-race favorite Marino Vanhoenacker, Luke Bell, Rutger Beke, Jason Shortis, Michael Göhner, Bert Jammaer and Natascha Badmann. Tom Lowe didn’t even start the race, but I haven’t heard anything of why that was the case.
Female Results
As noted above, the big result this weekend was Chrissie Wellington’s quick time, so I’ll start with the females:
Rank |
Name |
Nation |
Actual Time |
Expected Time |
1 |
Chrissie Wellington |
GBR |
08:33:56 |
08:40:32 |
2 |
Rachel Joyce |
GBR |
09:08:23 |
09:23:52 |
3 |
Diana Riesler |
GER |
09:20:37 |
n/a |
4 |
Silvia Felt |
GER |
09:24:31 |
n/a |
5 |
Amanda Stevens |
USA |
09:25:50 |
n/a |
6 |
Belinda Granger |
AUS |
09:28:59 |
09:28:29 |
7 |
Simone Benz |
SWI |
09:31:21 |
10:55:35 |
8 |
Martina Dogana |
ITA |
09:47:47 |
09:40:28 |
9 |
Yvette Grice |
GBR |
09:59:28 |
10:14:56 |
10 |
Eva Dollinger |
AUT |
10:00:24 |
09:34:34 |
11 |
Claire Horner |
SAF |
10:11:55 |
10:47:25 |
12 |
Helen Buley |
SAF |
10:26:29 |
10:17:14 |
13 |
Caroline Koll |
SAF |
10:37:39 |
10:17:59 |
Expected time is based on athlete’s rating (prior to race) and race conditions.
Chrissie posted a quicker time than her 8:36 at IM Arizona time from last November. (I find it a bit silly to call it an “IM world record” knowing that she posted an 8:19 in Roth 2010.) Looking at the statistics, the TOP4 best results ever are from Chrissie – and all on different courses!
Rank |
Name |
Adjusted Result |
Actual Result |
Race |
1 |
Wellington, Chrissie |
08:40:26 |
08:19:13 |
Challenge Roth on 2010-07-18 |
2 |
Wellington, Chrissie |
08:48:59 |
08:54:02 |
IM Hawaii on 2009-10-10 |
3 |
Wellington, Chrissie |
08:50:32 |
08:33:56 |
IM South Africa on 2011-04-10 |
4 |
Wellington, Chrissie |
09:00:42 |
08:36:13 |
IM Arizona on 2010-11-21 |
Simply amazing – for me that’s about as impressive as the fact that Chrissie posted the overall best run split. The sky seems to be the limit for her.
Behind Chrissie, Rachel Joyce had another great race, but her excellent 9:03 – twenty minutes quicker than expected – pales in comparison with Chrissie’s performance. With Natascha not finishing, I predicted Belinda Granger to round out the TOP3, but even with her solid 9:28 (almost exactly as predicted) it was a trio of three unrated pros coming in before her and Diana Riesler getting the third spot.
Male Results
On the male side, there was quite a bit back and forth at the top of the race, and finally home favorite Raynard Tissink was able to defend his title from last year. All the athletes that were much better rated than him dropped out (most notably Marino Vanhoenacker who was right in the mix), but it was a hard-fought win and he had to post a new course record of 8:05, more than 20 minutes quicker than expected. A really great performance from such an established athlete!
Rank |
Name |
Nation |
Actual Time |
Expected Time |
1 |
Raynard Tissink |
SAF |
08:05:36 |
08:28:38 |
2 |
Andreas Bocherer |
GER |
08:08:36 |
09:12:29 |
3 |
James Cunnama |
ZAF |
08:13:18 |
08:47:47 |
4 |
Daniel Fontana |
ITA |
08:18:51 |
08:33:00 |
5 |
Cyril Viennot |
FRA |
08:30:42 |
n/a |
6 |
Eduardo Sturla |
ARG |
08:32:52 |
08:27:20 |
7 |
Uwe Widmann |
GER |
08:33:39 |
08:30:42 |
8 |
Petr Vabrousek |
CZE |
08:40:36 |
08:46:06 |
9 |
Trevor Delsaut |
FRA |
08:41:57 |
n/a |
10 |
Balazs Csoke |
HUN |
08:43:06 |
n/a |
11 |
Dominik Berger |
AUT |
08:52:24 |
n/a |
12 |
Kent Horner |
SAF |
08:58:39 |
09:18:39 |
13 |
Toby Radcliffe |
GBR |
09:01:17 |
09:17:13 |
14 |
Mike Schifferle |
SWI |
09:04:02 |
09:07:13 |
15 |
Sergio Marques |
PRT |
09:09:30 |
08:50:00 |
16 |
Craig Twigg |
GBR |
09:10:01 |
n/a |
17 |
Gilad Rotem |
ISR |
09:12:06 |
n/a |
18 |
Erik-Simon Strijk |
NDL |
09:16:32 |
n/a |
19 |
Bryn Freeman |
SAF |
09:23:29 |
09:27:21 |
20 |
Erich Felbabel |
FRA |
09:23:36 |
n/a |
21 |
Marcel Bischof |
GER |
09:32:47 |
n/a |
22 |
Heinrich Sickl |
AUT |
10:08:14 |
09:28:07 |
23 |
Freddy Lampret |
SAF |
10:46:11 |
09:38:47 |
Expected time is based on athlete’s rating (prior to race) and race conditions.
After Raynard, my young countryman Andy Böcherer had a great result and came in second – more than one hour quicker than expected! (Then again, I just had one race in my database for him, probably one of his slower results.) Another South African, James Cunnama, managed to snag the last spot on the podium, he was also more than half an hour quicker than expected. A lot of people had told me that Cunnama was underrated before the race, so I’ll have a look at my methodology before my next round of predictions for IM Australia …