Potts Dominates, Hansen Earns First Ironman Title At Lake Placid

American Andy Potts led from start to finish and punched his ticket to the Ironman World Championship, while fellow American Jennie Hansen earned her first Ironman win thanks to a blazing marathon. Lake Placid delivered cool and wet conditions, with rain on and off throughout the day and temperatures hovering in the 60’s. As a late race in the pro Kona qualifying season neither the men’s or women’s fields were deep, but it was still a fun and competitive day.

Men’s Race
Potts led the men out of the 2.4-mile swim in Mirror Lake with a time of 46:48. Hungary’s Balazs Csoke was the next athlete into transition 2:34 later, with Daniel Fontana (ITA) not far behind. Potts quickly expanded on that lead and by mile 30 his gap out front stood at 5:49 over Fontanta and Csoke, who would spend the majority of their days trying to get Potts within sight.

Despite their best efforts, Potts grew the distance with every pedal stroke. As bike turned to run, Potts’ advantage stood at 10:39. Fontana slowly cut down the time to Potts, but the American’s lead was too much. Potts cruised through the marathon in 3:02:41 to earn his second victory in a row here with a time of 8:43:29. Fontana crossed the finish line exactly five minutes later to earn second. American Ian Mikelson overcame a tough bike ride to run his way to third with the fastest marathon of the day (2:53:41).

Women’s Race
Katy Blakemore (USA) narrowly led fellow American Dede Griesbauer out of the two-lap swim at 52:05. A few other pre-race female favorites came into T1 with their work cut out for them. This included Hansen, who was more than 11 minutes behind the leaders to start the bike.

Griesbauer quickly took the lead on the tough bike course and grew it to seven minutes over Blakemore and Australia’s Carrie Lester by the midway point. The American’s lead started to shrink on the back-half of the bike thanks to a solid effort from Lester. Griesbauer came into T2 with a 3:35 gap over Lester, but the real story was Hansen getting off of the bike in third with less than 9 minutes to make up on the leader.

Known for her strong marathon, it appeared that deficit wouldn’t be difficult for her to erase. Lester first overtook Griesbauer, but her time out front was limited. Hansen earned the lead around the half marathon point on the course and stormed her way to the finish line from there. Her 3:05:04 marathon gave her the first Ironman victory of her career in 9:35:06. Blakemore came back from a slower bike to finish second seven minutes later, with Lester rounding out the top three five minutes after that.

Ironman Lake Placid handed out the final Kona Pro Ranking points for the July qualifying period. This week 40 men and 28 women will be offered their slots to make the start at October’s Ironman World Championship. An additional 10 spots for the men and seven spots for the women will be handed out at the end of August.

Ironman Lake Placid
Lake Placid, N.Y. – July 28, 2013
2.4-mile swim, 112-mile bike, 26.2-mile run

Men
1. Andy Potts (USA) 8:43:29
2. Daniel Fontana (ITA) 8:48:29
3. Ian Mikelson (USA) 8:51:07
4. Balaz Csoke (HUN) 8:55:55
5. Ryan Cain (CAN) 8:57:58

Women
1. Jennie Hansen (USA) 9:35:06
2. Katy Blakemore (USA) 9:42:35
3. Carrie Lester (AUS) 9:47:59
4. Kristin Andrews (USA) 9:50:34
5. Danielle Kehoe (USA) 9:56:33

Complete results here.

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