A NEW WORLD CHAMPION, A FLYING BELGIAN, A HOME VICTORY AND A LONG EXPECTED DUEL!

The Busy Season is On

The triathlon season is peaking, every weekend countless races take place across the globe. Champagne showers are mixed with tears of joy and sweat is mixed with tears of disappointment. It’s the time of the year when champions are made.

A New World Champion

Cyril Viennot has won multiple IM races over the last couple of years. In 2014, he decided to quit his job and give it a go as a professional triathlete. The year had only just begun when bad luck struck: the quiet Frenchman was hit by a car during a training ride on the Spanish island of Lanzarote. A punctured lung and multiple fractures saw him out for multiple weeks. Doctors doubted that he would ever recover to a state which would allow him to make a living of the sport. In July last year, Cyril made his comeback over the IM distance and won IM UK straight away. The doubts were gone and the SCOTT athlete set his focus on the World Championships in Kona. With an impressive fifth place, Viennot proved his ability to compete with the best in the world. A couple of days ago, Cyril added his name to the list of World Champion triathletes that are riding on SCOTT. The ITU Long Distance is a format which is well known and respected in France. This year, an illustrious field lined up for the Worlds in Motola, Sweden. The swim course had to be shortened due to the low water temperatures. These circumstances favored strong bike-runners such as Cyril Viennot. With a nimble performance, especially on the closing run, Viennot claimed his first World Champion title. Well-deserved rainbow stripes we believe!

The Flying Belgian Spotted Repeatedly

Sub 8 hour performances over the IM distance are not a regular occurrence. Back to back sub 8 hours performances are almost nonexistent– especially if only 4 weeks lay between them. With a time of 7 hours 45 minutes and 58 seconds, Marino Vanhoenacker still holds the world record in an IM-labeled full distance event which he set in 2011. In the course of the last few weeks, the Belgian impressed with two sub 8 hour performances at the IM Continental Championships in Brazil and the IM Austria in Kärnten. Both times are amongst the 15 fastest times ever realized in IM races. Vanhoenacker’s victories in Brazil and Austria are even more impressive turning the clock back a few months. In October last year, Vanhoenacker had to walk large parts of the marathon at the IM World Championships due to massive pain in his leg. After the bike split he still had been in reach of a podium finish. A couple of weeks later, specialists in Belgium diagnosed him with a broken Sacrum. After several months without proper running training he was finally given green light to get back into full training. Shortly thereafter he was interviewed during a training camp where he confirmed the suspicion of the journalist that he had gained some weight. He was about 10 kilograms off race weight.  Well, things can change pretty quickly. 

Back to the Roots – Back to the Winning Streak

The 2013 IM Cairns was a turning point in Luke McKenzie’s career. After a tough year in 2012, he proved to the world and more importantly to himself that he was still able to win big races. It was only a few months after his victory on home soil that the Aussie posted a runner-up finish at the IM World Championships in Kona, his biggest success to date. It might be a coincidence that Luke decided to return to Cairns this year after a 2014 campaign that was neither exceptionally good nor exceptionally bad. Despite a stomach bug that hit him 10 days away from the race and still bothered him during the event, McKenzie won the race in an impressive manner. Luke’s performance in Cairns proves how much the mind can influence a performance in an IM distance event. On home soil, with the confidence of a past winner and the memories of his victory in 2013 even sickness couldn’t stop the Aussie from winning.

When Good is Not Enough

Last weekend we saw a long-awaited battle between two IM athletes that are currently seen as the best in the world. Sebastian Kienle and Jan Frodeno already dominated the pre-race discussions in 2014 and what started with the announcement that the 2008 Olympic Champion would focus on long distance events, is bound to continue in the big races to come. The defense of his 2014 IM European Championship title was Sebastian’s big goal for the first half of the 2015 season. Like last year, the reigning World Champion knew very well that good would not be enough to beat Frodeno in Frankfurt. Much can happen in 8 hours of racing and much can go wrong. While nothing particularly went wrong this past Sunday, Frodeno was simply an ounce stronger than Kienle in every discipline. While Sebastian prefers the big races with the best competition, it’s also a trait of his that he’s going for the win and not for second place. At the same time he has the guts to admit when somebody was stronger than him on race day and it fuels his motivation like nothing else to do better in the next big event. There are many positives about winning a championship title. The flipside, obviously, is that it cannot get any better. At best, one is able to claim the title again.

The Peak Goes On

In the weeks to come, the athletes enter the final round of the 2015 qualification period for the IM World Championships in Kona. While some are qualified already and set their focus on the big race in Hawaii, others focus on the last qualification races in order to gain enough points to race the Worlds. Certainly we will see more epic battles during the remainder of the season and we’re looking forward to it!