Frodeno, Ryf shine

Manama : Bahrain Endurance locked out the top spots at Challenge Roth in Germany with Jan Frodeno setting a new world record for long distance triathlon and Daniela Ryf logging the third-fastest finish time on the course.

Frodeno exited the water with a race-best 45:22-minute swim split over 3.8km, putting a minute’s distance between him, the rest of the large men’s field, and Andreas Raelert’s swim time from his world record-setting day in 2011. 

The German continued to pull away on the bike leg, logging 4 hours 9 minutes and 22 seconds on the 180km course and shaving off even more time from Raelert’s bike split (4:11:43) despite falling into a ditch on the second lap. 

Matching Raelert’s marathon time almost down to the second (2:40:53), the Olympic gold medallist and Ironman world champion smashed the old world record by six minutes, taking the victory (7:35:39).

“When I read the time, I was obviously really happy with it but it was a real mixture of disbelief and contentment,” he said.

He had made good on his word to break the world record, “I wanted to go big or go home, which is what you want to do when you want to break a record. I’ve worked hard and trained hard for this and I’m really, really glad to do this bucket list race.”

Ryf not only set the race-best swim split (49:10) but also came out ahead of all the pro males except for the top three. She tackled the bike leg with metronomic precision on the first lap, then put down the hammer to set a new bike course record (4:31:29). 

This put her 10 minutes ahead of Chrissie Wellington’s world record. She ultimately ran a new personal best (2:57:40), breaking the tape (8:22:04), just four minutes shy of the world record. Only Wellington, who hugged Ryf at the finish line, had ever gone faster.

“It’s a motivation to be as fast as Chrissie one day. She’s a legend and I really admire her, and how strong she was. But not everything is about the record. I do hope to come back here one day and race faster,” said Ryf. “Big respect to Frodo for saying he was going for the record before the race and actually doing it.”

Both Frodeno and Ryf were in a different zip code to their pursuers, their lead uncontested from start to finish and stopping the clock 20 minutes ahead of the rest of the field. Their wins marked the first time Ironman World Champions had gone on to win Challenge Roth which is celebrating its 15th anniversary.

Ben Hoffman was also in action, crossed the finish line in fourth at the XTERRA Mountain Championships in Beaver Creek, Colorado.