Ironman World Championship Qualification Set, XTERRA World Cup penultimate, and More

Published August 18, 2025 08:34AM

This weekend was the last chance for athletes to qualify to the Ironman World Championship, with Ironman Kalmar-Sweden for the women and Ironman Copenhagen for the men. It was also the XTERRA European Championship in Zittau, which is the penultimate race in the XTERRA World Cup. Also, XTERRA Ruidoso took place in New Mexico, which gives us an interesting preview as that is where the XTERRA World Championship will be in 2026 when it returns to the U.S. Plus, read the results from other interesting races last weekend.

Sodaro validates world champs qualification spot at Ironman Kalmar-Sweden

The 2022 Ironman World Champion, Chelsea Sodaro (USA), has battled some illness and niggles this season and had to change her race plans, resulting in Ironman Kalmar-Sweden being Sodaro’s last and only chance to validate her Automatic Qualifier for the Ironman World Championships. But in true champion style, Sodaro got the job done and will be back in Kona.

Sodaro finished third in Sweden, behind Denmark’s Katrine Graesbøll Christensen and Marlene De Boer (NLD). For Christensen, it was her first Ironman win, and came just a couple of weeks after she took her first Ironman 70.3 win in Krakow. Christensen was second at Ironman Sweden in 2024, and 17th at the Ironman World Championship in Nice. Then, she started 2025 with third place in South Africa before a tough couple of months with her mother passing away and some DNFs. But this ex-elite kayaker, and mum of a 6-year-old, has bounced back well to take her first two race wins.

Athletes push the run pace at Ironman Copenhagen

We saw some very fast run times in Copenhagen for the last 2025 Ironman World Championship qualifying race for the men. Finn Grosse-Freese (DEU) won the race, running a 2:32:43 to take the lead with just a couple of kilometers to go! Grosse-Freese already has his Nice qualification as does second-place finisher Mathias Petersen (DEN), so it rolled to third-place Jesper Svensson (SWE). Svensson declined, rolling it further to fourth-place Zack Cooper (GBR).

For me, Cooper was the standout performance. Cooper has only been a professional for a few years, but he is improving in leaps and bounds with every race. Cooper is really developing his bike/run combo as a weapon. In Copenhagen, he had the third-fastest bike (4:00:11) and second-fastest run (2:34:06). The swim is his weakest discipline. He gave away almost 10 minutes to the leaders in Copenhagen but then biked/ran himself up into contention.

This is his best result to date. Especially when he has raced three full-distance events in the last two months (Ironman Austria, where he placed sixth, Challenge Roth 11th, and Ironman Copenhagen fourth). Cooper is 6 feet, 5 inches tall, and coached by Javier Solalo, the performance coach for UAE Team Emirates. He made the move to Solalo at the start of the year, and it seems to be paying off. It’s exciting to see what Cooper can do over the coming years.

XTERRA World Cup competition heats up with penultimate competition at European Championship

The penultimate stop in the XTERRA World Cup doubles as the European Championship. Zittau, Germany, has hosted a triathlon for the past 25 years, and for the fifth time at this location has hosted the European Championship. The dust has only just settled after the double header in the Czech Republic last week, which saw an epic sprint finish in the short track between Aneta Grabmuller Soldati (CZE) and Marta Menditto (ITA). Grabmuller won in her home country race. It was also all change in the overall World Cup standings, Menditto moving to the top, as the prior leader, Alizee Paties (FRA), who had been so dominant all year, was out with injury.

Paties was still out in Germany, and now drops to third in the series, as Menditto still holds the top spot, and Grabmuller moves into second. Menditto and Grabmuller are really evenly matched and often finish close together. Sadly, Grabmuller has missed three races, and with all races counting toward the overall series, has therefore fewer points than Menditto, and we are perhaps robbed of a down-to-the-wire battle for the World Cup title. In fact, with just a short track race left, and a maximum of 75 points for the winner, it is not enough for Grabmuller to catch Menditto, so Menditto will take the World Cup.

However, in Zittau, it was the 2024 World Champion Solenne Billouin (FRA) who took the win. Billouin raced back in Australia, the first stop of the World Cup, where she finished second (full), and third (short track), but since then has switched her attention to the 70.3 distance, gaining her pro card after her first 70.3 of the year. However, the Frenchwoman returned to off-road racing to take the European title.

Another mention should go to Isla Hedley (GBR). The up-and-coming British athlete has come third in the races she’s competed in. She was the 2025 U23 World Cross Triathlon Champion, and if she had been able to do a few more races on the World Cup Series, she could well have been challenging for the top spot or at least the podium.

In the men’s race, Denmark’s Jens Emil Sloth Nielsen took another win, and has had two second-place finishes and now a first in the last three races. At the start of the year, he also had two first-place finishes and a second-place finish. But unfortunately, he missed the next four races, and so is down in sixth in the overall rankings, rather than being right up there in the mix for the title with the Forissier brothers, Felix and Arthur (FRA). Felix is holding onto the top spot, just 12 points ahead of his brother. Arthur Serrieres (FRA) had another great race (finishing second) in just his third event of the year; again, it would have been so exciting if Nielsen and Serrieres had both raced the whole year.

There was another XTERRA event this past weekend, too, although not part of the XTERRA World Cup, XTERRA Ruidoso. This brand new event will be host to the XTERRA World Championship in 2026, so a good opportunity to have a glimpse at what the World Championships may be when they return to the USA next year. Also, interestingly, former-pro triathlete Tim O’Donnell finished fifth overall (winning the 45-49 Age Group). O’Donnell has transitioned away from professional triathlon and dabbled a few times in off-road racing, but this is by far his best result to date.

Ironman 70.3 Louisville results

In ridiculously hot conditions, Jackie Hering (USA) took the women’s race and Jason West (USA) the men’s. It was West’s first win since 2023, and just under a month after his first Ironman at Lake Placid, where he finished fifth.

Hering took the lead early on in the bike and held that position to the finish, whereas West was chasing hard to run down Trevor Folley (USA) to secure the win.

Embrunman results

This is one of the iconic events in our sport. Embrunman in France is brutally tough – a 3.8K swim, 185K bike with 5,000 meters of elevation, and a 42.3K run.

Alanis Siffert (SUI) is only 23 but already has a great resume and a very bright future. She has added Embrunman and a new course record to her resume. Siffert races a lot, but she doesn’t necessarily race Ironman-branded races. Yet, she has an impressive resume and is ranked 31st in the Professional Triathlon Organization (PTO) world rankings. She is coached by Brett Sutton, so it’s no real surprise that she is racing a lot, even at such an early age, and with a lot of long-distance races.

Siffert took an impressive third at Challenge Roth earlier this year, and it’ll be interesting to see when she races more of the Ironman-branded events (if she does) to see how she will compare to many of the top women.

Challenge Family – Gunsan-Saemangeum results

Mike Philips (NZL) and Sophie Malowiecki (AUS) won Challenge Gunsan-Saemangeum in South Korea. For Malowiecki, it was her first professional win.