Sudrie, Steffen win ITU LD Worlds
Sylvain Sudrie of France topped defending champ Timothy O’Donnell of the United States and Caroline Steffen of Switzerland dominated the women’s field to win the 2010 ITU long distance Worlds at Immenstadt, Germany..
Sudrie combined the fastest swim (48:36) with the third-fastest 120k bike (3:35:59) and third-fastest 30k run (1:56:26) to hit the finish in 6:24:57 with a 4:38 margin of victory over runner-up O’Donnell. Sudrie was virtually even with O’Donnell on the swim and run, but avenged his narrow 2009 loss to O’Donnell for this title at Perth, Australia thanks to a 5:20 advantage on the bike at Immenstadt.
Francois Chabaud of France lost five minutes to the leaders with his 53:52 swim, but clawed back to the final spot on the podium thanks to a sizzling fast, second-best 3:34:27 bike and a 10th best 1:59:44 run that left him 7:07 back of Sudrie and 28 seconds ahead of 4th place Jonas Djurback of Sweden. Konstantin Bachor of Germany took 5th, 29 seconds back of Djurback.
The win adds another notch to Sudrie’s improving resume that includes a 4th at the 2009 Ironman 70.3 World Championship.
Caroline Steffen, whose 2010 season already includes wins at Ironman 70.3 events in Singapore, Geelong and Switzerland as well as 2nd place finishes at Ironman South Africa and Ironman Europe at Frankfurt, smashed the women’s field at Immenstadt. She combined the women’s fastest swim and bike and second-fastest run to finish in 6:55:21 and take an 11 minutes, 43-seconds margin of victory over Yvonne Van Vlerken of the Netherlands.
Steffen started her day with a 54:01 4k swim that gave her a 3-seconds margin over Virginia Berasategui of Spain and a whopping 6:32 over Van Vlerken, who is a two time Challenge Roth winner, the 2006 ITU long course duathlon world champ and the 2008 Ironman World Championship runner-up.
Steffen, a member of the Swiss national cycling team in 2007 and 2008, then crushed all resistance with a 3:48:00 bike that was 7:15 faster than Van Vlerken and 7:47 faster than Berasategui.
Steffen’s second-best 2:09:45 run then could easily afford to give back 2:08 to Van Vlerken on the 30k run and soak in the cheers of the crowd at the finish.
Berasategui, the 3rd place finisher at Ironman Hawaii last year, fell back to third place, 6:15 back of Van Vlerken, with a closing 2:19:55 run, but still had a comfortable 29:25 advantage over 4th place Anja Ippach of Germany.
Steffen, a member of Brett Sutton’s vaunted Team TBB squad, thus gained her first world championship to go with her 4th place at the 2009 Ironman 70.3 Worlds and three Ironman 70.3 titles so far this year.
ITU Long Distance World Championship
Immenstadt, Germany
August 1, 2010
S 4k / B 120k/ R 30k
Unofficial Results
Elite Men
1. Sylvain Sudrie (FRA) 6:24:57
2. Timothy O’Donnell (USA) 6:29:35
3. Francois Chabaud (FRA) 6:32:04
4. Jonas Djurback (SWE) 6:32:32
5. Konstantin Bachor (GER) 6:33:01
6. Jimmy Johnsen (DEN) 6:35:14
7. Viktor Zyemtsev (UKR) 6:36:42
8. Esben Hovgaard (DEN) 6:36:48
9. Rasmus Stubager (DEN) 6:38:46
10. Olivier Marceau (SUI) 6:40:30
24. Justin Hurd (USA) 7:05:13
32. Adam Jensen (USA) 7:33:38
Elite Women
1. Caroline Steffen (SUI) 6:55:21
2. Yvonne Van Vlerken (NED) 7:07:04
3. Virginia Berasategui (ESP) 7:13:19
4. Anja Ippach (GER) 7:42:44
5. Tamara Kozulina (UKR) 7:45:15
6. Susanna Skylv Sorensen (DEN) 7:51:36
