70.3 New Orleans

About an hour before the race the athletes received word that the Ironman 70.3 New Orleans would be a triathlon without any swimming. High winds on Lake Pontchartrain were to blame. Instead of a collective dive into the water, the athletes started a 90k individual time trial with a 30 second-interval, followed by a half marathon.
With 750 valuable points on the line for the pro's this format was going to hurt the stronger swimmers of the field such as Dirk Bockel, Luke McKenzie , and Paul Matthews to mention a few.

Athletes getting ready for there bike-run combo

With high winds, Sebastian Kienle’s explosive 2:02:19 bike split rocketed him to a dominating victory, while Julie Dibens’ race-best 2:15:16 bike gave her all of her 76-second margin of victory over blueseventys own Samantha Warriner at what became virtually the Ironman 69.1 New Orleans.


After his race best bike performance, Kienle’s 5th-best 1:14:26 run was enough to hold off two-time ITU duathlon world champion Amey’s fastest 1:12:17 half-marathon and  blueseventy's Paul Matthews’ second-best 1:13:21 run . Kienle hit the finish of the shortened event in 3:18:08 with Amey exactly 5 minutes behind and Matthews 7:16 in arrears. 


Big congrats to all those who finished in tough windy conditions. Until the next time ...
Fingers crossed we get wet at the next one. 


RESULTS

Elite Men

1. Sebastian Kienle (GER) 3:18:08
2. Paul Amey (GBR) 3:23:08
3. Paul Matthews (AUS) 3:25:24
4. Richie Cunningham (AUS) 3:25:54
5. Terenzo Bozzone (NZL) 3:26:16
6. Dirk Bockel (LUX) 3:26:22
7. Axel Zeebroek (BEL) 3:27:15
8. Matthew Russell ( ) 3:27:24
9. Trevor Wurtele (CAN) 3:28:01
10. Kyle Leto (USA) 3:28:11

Elite Women

1. Julie Dibens (GBR) 3:40:15
2. Samantha Warriner (NZL) 3:41:31
3. Yvonne Van Vlerken (NED) 3:44:30
4. Linsey Corbin (USA) 3:46:19
5. Tine Deckers (BEL) 3:46:23
6. Heather Jackson (USA) 3:48:32
7. Uli Bromme (USA) 3:48:56
8. Sonja Tajsich (GER) 3:50:00
9. Sofie Goos (BEL) 3:52:11
10. Amy Kloner (USA) 3:53:09