After this year’s Kona race a lot of posts focus on the “German Podium Sweep” – not all of them (including one of my tweets) made it sufficiently clear that this “sweep” only refers to the male side.

(Photo: Kona 2016 Podium, Credit Jay Prasuhn)

Here’s a fuller look at the nationality of top Kona finishers using the following parameters:

• Pro Category only (as soon as that’s relevant as early Kona races didn’t distinguish “elite” and different age groups)
• Overall and split for male and female athletes
• Winners and Podium (Top 3) finishers
• “All Results” (all Kona races since February 1978) and “modern” races since 1996 (1995 was the last year that both the male and female winner were from the US)

Winners

Here’s the breakdown of the nations of all male and female Kona winners from the first race in February 1978 to October 2016 – all in all 40 male and 39 female winners:

The only “triathlon exotic” country in the list is Zimbabwe, that is due to Paula Newby-Frazer racing for Zimbabwe until 1992 for five titles, she won another three when racing for the USA afterwards (according to the Wikipedia article on the Ironman World Championship).

The USA is still the clear leader in overall wins. That changes however when you only look at the winners since 1996:

Australia has the most wins since 1996, closely followed by Switzerland, Germany and Canada.

While Australia has a relatively even split between male and female wins (6 male to 4 female wins), all Swiss wins are from the female side:

In contrast to that all German wins are on the male side:

Podium Finishers

There is a similar development when looking at podium finishes (total 234, 120  male and 114 on the female side as early years didn’t fill all podium spots). The US still has the most overall podium finishers :

The “Other” category includes Brasil 6, Finland 3, Netherlands 2, Spain 2, and France, Denmark and Chile with one each.

The US is no longer in the top spot if you look at Kona races since 1996:

Since 1996 Germany has had the most podium spots, with the “German dudes” dominating the male podium spots:

On the female side it’s a pretty close race between Australia with 14 podium finishers, Switzerland with 13, Canada with 11 and the UK with 10:

Note: This post will be updated as the race progresses with my synopsis of the current situation and some preliminary analysis.

Preliminary Women’s Race Analysis (Race Time 9:50)

After the initial result analysis this year’s Kona race was relatively fast, an adjustment of -2:42 is the fastest since 2013 and about 2 minutes quicker than typical for Kona, mainly because the swim was fast. (This may change a bit when I include all race results that haven’t yet been when running this analysis.)

We’ve seen two course records: Daniela Ryf posted a new overall record (beating Rinny’s time from 2013), and Patrick Lange posted a new run course record (beating the old Mark Allen time form 1989).

Preliminary Men’s Race Analysis (Race Time 8:45)

Updated at Race Time 10:00

Women in T2 (Race Time 6:30)

Here are the fastest female bike times:

1. Daniela Ryf (SUI) 4:52:26
2. Heather Jackson (USA) 5:00:31
3. Anja Beranek (GER) 5:00:42
4. Melissa Hauschildt (AUS) 5:05:21
5. Lucy Gossage (GBR) 5:06:01
6. Annabel Luxford (AUS) 5:06:46
7. Sarah Piampiano (USA) 5:07:29
8. Mary Beth Ellis (USA) 5:07:30
9. Meredith Kessler (USA) 5:07:45
10. Kaisa Lehtonen (FIN) 5:08:54

Men in T2 (Race Time 5:50)

With the first men in T2, here are the ten fastest bike times:

1. Boris Stein (GER) 4:23:04
2. Sebastian Kienle (GER) 4:23:55
3. Michael Weiss (AUT) 4:25:51
4. Lionel Sanders (CAN) 4:26:35
5. Luke McKenzie (AUS) 4:27:55
6. Ben Hoffman (USA) 4:28:06
7. Andi Boecherer (GER) 4:28:07
8. Jan Frodeno (GER) 4:29:00
9. Timothy O’Donnell (USA) 4:29:10
10. Eneko Llanos (ESP) 4:30:48

Women’s Turn at Hawi (Race Time 4:00)

While there is a big front group on the men’s side, it’s no surprise that in the women’s race Daniela Ryf has managed to build a lead of about three minutes. It’s a surprise that German Anja Beranek has been able to stay with her, but she needs a good position in T2 as Daniela can run 20 minutes into Anja.

The first chase group consisting of Mary Beth Ellis, Meredith Kessler, Jodie Swallow, Michelle Vesterby and Annabel Luxford sitting about three minutes back. None of them have been running really well, it’s unlikely that they can close the gap to Daniela on the marathon.

Rinny is now about 9:30 back from Daniela – it was four minutes after the swim, so Dani’s lead could grow to around 14 minutes in T2 if things continue to develop in the same way. Some strong athletes are now riding in front of Rinny: Van Vlerken and Hauschildt are 8:30 behind Daniela, both have only lost 2:30 to Daniela on the bike and are steadily improving their position in the field.

Men’s Turn at Hawi (Race Time 3:30)

By now most of the slower swimmers but strong bike riders have made a lot of the deficit they had after the swim. There is a large group of 12 athletes at the front that is about to get shattered on the way back into T2.

Among these are

• The Germans Jan Frodeno, Andi Böcherer, Sebastian Kienle and Boris Stein (especially Boris is in a much better position than last year when he finished 10th)
• The Americans Tim O’Donnell, Andy Potts and Ben Hoffmann
• Australians Luke McKenzie and Tim Berkel
• Spaniard Eneko Llanos and Brasilian Igor Amorelli

The Austrian Michael Weiss (back to IM racing after serving a two-year doping penalty) is probably more focused on chasing the bike course record – his run is usually not strong enough for a Top 10 finish.

It’s probably more interesting to follow strong runner such as David McNamee (2:26 back), Bart Aernouts (2:54) or Lionel Sanders who has closed down the gap from 8 minutes after the swim to 3:01 at the turn. Brent McMahon is more than 6 minutes back after serving a penalty, last year’s second Andi Raelert has also had a penalty.

Women’s Swim (Race Time: 2:20)

Athletes that had better than expected swims (and by how much):

• Laurel Wassner 2:43 faster
• Tine Holst 1:33
• Katja Konschak 1:27
• Sarah Piampiano 1:24
• Julia Gajer 1:11

Slower than expected were

• Kaisa Lehtonen 2:58 slower
• Linsey Corbin 2:52
• Jodie Swallow 2:46
• Daniela Saemmler 2:09
• Susie Cheetham 1:40
• Melissa Hauschildt 1:26
• Meredith Kessler 1:18

Men’s Swim (Race Time: 2:00)

The swim analysis has taken some time as the tracker has taken some time to update with the swim data. The times have been faster than in previous years: The swim rating of the Kona course is -4:30, the preliminary adjustment comes in at only -1:28, so roughly 3 minutes faster than what is normal for Kona.

Some athletes that had great swim results (faster than expected):

• Matt Russell 5:31 faster
• James Cunnama 2:17
• Rudi Wild 2:08
• Ben Hoffman 1:34
• Joe Skipper 1:29
• Boris Stein 1:25
• Jordan Rapp 1:08
• Andi Raelert 0:50

Slower than expected were

• Markus Thomschke 2:09 slower
• Will Clarke 1:34
• Per Bittner 1:25