RaceConditions

The first of the Regional Championships in Melbourne started a bit later than planned: Strong winds made the Ocean very choppy, and it was decided to delay the start and shorten the swim, officially to a 1.9k swim but apparently even shorter. (Probably more out of a concern for the slower age groupers than the Pros, as it would have been very tricky logistically to shorten the swim only for the Pros.) Some comments I heard indicated that the swim was still pretty “special” with very high waves.

The shortened swim makes it tricky to do a proper statistical analysis of the race. I have run my usual programs and present the results in this post:

• The swim produced an adjustment factor of 120%, i.e. you’d have to more than double the times to get close to an Ironman swim time. (This implies a swim course of about 1.7k).
• The bike and swim adjustments are still a bit faster than “the average course”, but pretty much in line with typical adjustments. As conditions were not that favorable (strong winds etc.), this either means that the bike was a bit short or that the athletes were able to bike quicker after the shorter swim. The run was severely short last year, this year the times indicate that the length was okay.

All in all, there are enough factors for me to decide not to include the Melbourne results in my ratings system. I’m showing them here nonetheless in my usual fashion, but one shouldn’t draw too many discrete conclusions from them.

Male Race Results

Almost all pre-race predictions (including mine) saw a close race between Marino and Crowie. On race day however, Eneko Llanos put together the best race, winning with the fastest run split of the day. Marino had the fastest bike split and ran a very respectable 2:51 marathon – good enough to hold off Crowie who ran out of steam running down Marino. Jordan Rapp was placed a good forth, but way back from the podium. Veteran Chris Legh and up-and-comer Per Bittner were next two – not too many had these athletes on their list.

Female Race Results

On the female side, Corinne Abraham stunned everyone, delivering the best bike and run splits. Clearly, she’d have been able to go sub-9 if the swim wasn’t shortened. The shorter swim played into the card of Yvonne Van Vlerken who managed to limit the losses on the swim and bike and was able to run down Caroline who paced third. I hope Caroline saves her best performance of her 2013 season for Kona! Veterans Natascha Badmann (who was in the lead for some time on the bike) and Gina Crawford (already her third long-distance race of the year!) were next.

If you’ve come for my preview posts for Melbourne, here are the main articles:

• IM Melbourne 2013 – Predictions
• IM Melbourne 2013 – How the race might unfold

If you have your own opinion on who is going to win this race, please check-out IM Betting and you win a nice price! Luke Dragstra and I have put together this site – you can submit your picks for the top 10 on the men’s side and the top 6 for the women. The best bets (overall, men and women) and a random drawing will win some nice prices from our partners Planet X and Magic Sportfood such as a Carbon wheel set,  a bike jersey with matching shorts and a tri-suit or tri-top and tri-short.

Race Conditions

Conditions in Los Cabos seemed to be pretty hard. The swim had an adjustment of -2:29 (as far as I know it was a non-wetsuit swim in the ocean), the bike’s adjustment was -2:26 (apparently quite hilly), and the run was a little quicker, leading to an overall adjustment (and as this was the first race on this course) of -3:09.

Male Race Results

Timo Bracht redeemed himself after his DNF in Western Australia. He took control of the race on the bike, quickly shook off Maik Twelsiek after T2 and was never really in danger. Maik was in 2nd place for a long time, before being overtaken by the best runners, Trevor Delsaut and Joszef Major, and also IM-rookie Jeff Symonds.

Female Race Results

The main excitement in the women’s race stemmed from the fact that Erika Csomor’s time chip wasn’t working properly, so the first time she showed up was late in the run when it IMLive had her “in the top 3 and making a push towards the front”. She overtook Michelle Vesterby (who also had some chip issues) around the 40k mark and won by less than a minute. Lisa Ribes had a fantastic run and rounds out the top 3. Long-time leader Mareen Hufe from Germany dropped to fourth – still a very solid performance from her. My pre-race favorite Ashley Clifford wasn’t quite able to repeat her fantastic run from Florida and finished in 9th. Hillary Biscay was the last of the Pro women – she must have had a shocker bike ride.

Along the lines of my New Zealand predictions, I’ve tried to determine how the Melbourne race might unfold. My usual caveat applies: This is a statistical prediction, and doesn’t take race dynamics, form on race day and a lot of other factors into account. But it should give you a good indication of what to expect on race day and identify potential surprises.
If you have your own opinion on who is going to win this race, please check-out IM Betting and you can win a nice price! Luke Dragstra and I have put together this site – you can submit your picks for the top 10 on the men’s side and the top 6 for the women. The best bets (overall, men and women) and a random drawing will win some nice prices from our partners Planet X and Magic Sportfood such as a Carbon wheel set,  a bike jersey with matching shorts and a tri-suit or tri-top and tri-short.

Men’s Race

Here’s a look how the men’s race might develop:

A short summary:

• Clayton Fettel is probably the fastest swimmer in the field – he will probably be about three minutes ahead of the main field.
• After him, the distances will be small and all the big names should be close together, three (Crowie) to five minutes (Cam) back.
• Clayton will continue to lead on the bike, and only Marino will be able to make up time on him (probably without closing the gap completely).
• After these there will be a group with Crowie, Eneko, David Dellow and Joe Gambles, around five minutes back. Luke Bell might be able to hold on to the group, and Jordan Rapp might be able to ride up to them.
• Once on the run, Clayton will fall back. Marino will take the lead, but it looks as if Crowie is going to catch him around the 30k mark. We may also see a similar development as in Kona: Marino going for the win, and either winning or blowing up trying. (But I suspect he will hold back a little, with his DNF in Kona he needs the points to qualify.)
• The race for third will also be pretty close, similar to last year we may have big groups running together. Candidates for the last podium spot are Eneko (probably the best runner of these), David Dellow (who might have improved further), Cam Brown (looking to repeat his great 2012 performance and redeem himself for the third position in his home race), Jordan Rapp (who said on Twitter he is “here for the win”) and potential dark horse Victor del Corral (winner of IM Lanzarote). With such a group of athletes, anything can happen.

Women’s Race

Here’s what the numbers for the women’s race predict:

As for the men, here is the summary:

• The list of potential leaders after the swim is very short: Amanda Stevens is simply the best female swimmer in the IM circuit.
• After her, there will already be some gaps between the next athletes. Caroline will be about 4:30 back, Yvonne over 10 minutes. There will be a bigger group of athletes around 13 minutes back, look for Natascha Badmann and Corinne Abraham.
• Xena will take the lead within an hour on the bike, and will open a big gap. I expect her lead after the bike to be more than 8 minutes, even without posting another world best IM bike time as she did last year.
• Meredith Kessler will be in second place for most of the bike, behind her Yvonne should gain a few spots and finish the bike pretty close to MBK.
• The numbers indicate that Yvonne will be able to almost close the gap to Xena on the run, but that would mean having to make up about 15 seconds per k. The more likely scenario (similar to what I think for the men) is that one of them either blows up trying to win, or holding back a little after it is clear how the race will unfold. (Yvonne needs the points, Xena just has to validate.)
• The race for third will also be quite interesting: The numbers project both Natascha and Gina overtaking Meredith, but I’m sure that Meredith will have a lot of confidence after holding on to her lead in IM New Zealand. Behind these three, Corinne Abraham should have the strongest run, but she will probably be too far back after the bike to join the fight for third.