Lake San Antonio, California – Michael Raelert, the defending Ironman 70.3 World Champion used a record setting half-marathon to seal his victory at the 28th Avia Wildflower Long Course Triathlon.
Rasmus Henning led a tight pack out of the water that included Raelert, as well as Eneko Llanos, Philip Graves, Martin Jensen, Joe Umphenour and Kevin Everett into T1.
Raelert put the hammer down in on the bike, taking the lead and never looking back. Conrad Stoltz, 3 time XTERRA World Champion put a scare into the field with the second fastest bike leg of the race. However, the fact that he had competed in and won XTERRA Las Vegas just one week prior and that his specialty usually consists of a 10k run showed as he faded on the half-marathon course.
Rasmus Henning fell as far back as 9th during the bike, but put in a time second only Raelert on the run. However it was too little too late as he finished 5th. Joe Gambles and Eneko Llanos ran steady races to finish second and third respectively.
In the women’s race, Julie Dibbins led wire to wire to take the in a course record time of 4:27:53. Desiree Ficker ran the fastest half marathon of the race to close on Dibbins, but it wasn’t enough. Another three time XTERRA World Champion drop in, Melanie McQuaid, used a stellar bike ride to move to third place before fading to fifth behind third place finisher Virginia Berasategui and 4th place Magali Tisseyre.
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