Ironman Lake Placid – Pontano & Shea-Kenney Outlast Mother Nature

On a day which saw torrential downpours from the gun, Spain’s Francisco Pontano and American Caitlin Shea-Kenney each pulled off wins in dramatic fashion, showcasing their respective strengths.

The 10th edition of Ironman USA in Lake Placid New York opened with a cool fog over Mirror Lake, not unlike many previous years. Participants typically can expect favorable conditions, with temperatures topping off in the low to mid 70s and an otherwise good hand dealt from Mother Nature. Unfortunately for competitors and participants alike, Ironman Lake Placid 2008 will be remembered for soaking downpours – which let up only a few minutes over the 17-hour day.

At 6:50 a.m. the first of two starts sent 40 professional men and women off into a two-lap swim in Mirror Lake (the age groupers would start their day 10 minutes later, at 7:00). As is often the case, the swim specialists who made a statement and quickly put a gap over the men's field were the eventual winner, Pontano, and the Texan, James Bonney.

Bonney was doing most of the work through the first lap, with Pontano right on his heels as they exited the swim in tandem – in 22:51 and 22:53, respectively. At the halfway point, they had already built up a 25-30 second lead over two other pre-race favorites: Mathias Hecht of Switzerland and cycling powerhouse Bjorn Andersson of Sweden.

On the women’s side, American Hillary Biscay found herself in a familiar position leading through the first lap of the swim, exiting the 1.2-mile loop in 25:03, roughly 15 seconds ahead of the second-place female, Ali Fitch (who would eventually be forced to drop out due to a crash on the bike).

The balance of the swim proved to be a near repeat of the first lap, with Pontano leading the way into the transition with a blazing time of 46:07, closely followed by Bonney just two seconds behind. By the end of the 2.4 miles, the two leaders had put over two minutes on the chase group, including Hecht and Andersson who exited the water in 48:15 and 48:24 respectively.

Top Five Men (Swim):
1. Francisco Pontano - 46:07
2. James Bonney - 46:09
3. Mathias Hecht - 48:15
4. Bjorn Andersson - 48:24
5. Courtney Ogden - 50:50

For the professional women, the swim proved to spread things out much more with over seven minutes separating the pre-race favorites. Biscay continued to lead, exiting the water in 51:02, over 90 seconds up on second-place Ali Fitch, and two and a half minutes up on the eventual winner Shea-Kenney. 2006 Ironman Hawaii runner-up Desiree Ficker was a full seven minutes down after the swim, not a daunting time considering she is one of the more dominant runners in the sport – having recently qualified and competed in the U.S. Olympic Trials in the Marathon.

Top Five Women (Swim)
1. Hillary Biscay - 51:02
2. Ali Fitch - 52:34
3. Caitlin Shea-Kenney - 53:43
4. Marie Danais - 55:05
5. Desiree Ficker - 58:08

In the age-group race, Chip Berry also found himself in familiar territory as he led over 2,300 amateurs out of the water in 50:02. Leading out of the water is nothing new for this Springfield, Virginia resident as he was also first out of the water in last month’s Eagleman 70.3.

And then the rains came…

The two-loop Ironman Lake Placid bike course is one of the more challenging in the sport, as the majority of the climbing comes in the second half of each 56-mile loop:

 

Another element presenting itself was that it had started to rain… and rain… and rain – HARD! As one can see from the course profile, much of the first 20 miles of the bike are spent heading downhill, often at speeds well over 40 mph. These speeds coupled with heavy downpours created a treacherous bike course, and added another challenging element to an already tough race.

The men’s race played out as expected, with Swede Bjorn Andersson putting the hammer down early and making up those two minutes lost in the swim by the 20-mile mark of the bike. With that, Pontano wasn’t so quick to relinquish the lead and he picked up his pace, matching Andersson through the first lap of the bike. They came through the 56-mile point in tandem, with Andersson averaging nearly 25 mph in 2:15:07 to Pontano’s 2:17:37 (24.4 mph average). This blistering pace put in a huge gap on the other contenders as the Spaniard and the Swede had built up an eight-minute lead over the early swim leader Bonney, who was riding in third.

On the women’s side, Biscay was also splintering the women’s field and built up a seven-minute lead over Vermont’s Kim Loeffler. The shuffling continued in the women’s race as Ficker moved into third and New Jersey’s Jacqui Gordon was putting in a great ride through the rain, coming through the 56-mile mark in fourth – 11 minutes down on the leader Biscay.

The Pontano/Andersson show continued through the next 56 miles on the bike, and by the end, the two entered transition together with a lead of over 13 minutes on the next rider.

Top Five Men (off the bike):
1. Bjorn Andersson - 5:36:13 (time is swim and bike split combined)
2. Francisco Pontano - 5:36:14
3. Mathias Hecht - 5:49:27
4. Damien Favre-Felix - 5:52:43
5. Christian Brader - 5:54:57

As was the case through the first lap, Biscay was trying to put some much-needed time in the bank as the chasing group of Loeffler, Ficker and Shea-Kenney would be eating up the pavement once the athletes moved from bike to run. Biscay managed to get a nice cushion to start the marathon with a seven-minute gap over second-place Loeffler, and over 20 minutes on the rest of the chasers including Ficker, Gordon and Shea-Kenney. It’s impossible to make up a 23-minute gap over the marathon – right?

Top Five Women (off the bike):
1. Hillary Biscay - 6:27:12 (time is swim and bike split combined)
2. Kim Loeffler - 6:34:42
3. Desiree Ficker - 6:46:57
4. Jacqui Gordon - 6:48:55
5. Caitlin Shea-Kenney - 6:51:05

Well don’t tell that to Shea-Kenney, as she did just that, going to work from the first step of the marathon and eating into that lead with every stride through the rain-soaked course. By the 10-mile mark, Biscay remained in the lead, but had given back five minutes to Loeffler and 10 minutes to the hard-charging Shea-Kenney. Shea-Kenney went through the first 13 miles of the run in just over 1:29, to Biscay’s 1:43 and Loeffler’s 1:36. There’s no doubt everyone was doing the math and saw this was going to be a tight race to the finish.

That it was, as less then four minutes separated first and second at the finish line. Loeffler took the lead from Biscay before the 20-mile mark, but by 23 miles, Shea-Kenney continued to charge hard; and with less than 5K to go, she surged past Loeffler to break the tape in 9:51. In the process, she also shattered Heather Fuhr’s run-course record with a 2:59:59, nearly even-splitting the run with 1:29:27 and 1:30:28. To put some perspective on how fast her run was, only three men had faster run splits on the day! Shea-Kenney was closely followed by Loeffler (9:54:55) and Biscay (9:58), who incidentally was just eight days off another Iron-distance sixth-place performance at the Challenge Roth, where she finished in 9:24.

Not to be outdone, there was a very strong contingent of amateurs as five of the top-10 women overall were from the age group ranks. 40-year-old Leslie Sanderson of Ontario crossed the line in fourth place overall, besting all but three professional women.

Top 10 Women (Finish)
1. Caitlin Shea-Kenney - 9:51:00
2. Kim Loeffler - 9:54:55
3. Hillary Biscay - 9:58:45
4. Leslie Sanderson - 10:18:04 (First Place Women’s 40-44)
5. Fiona Gray-Whitby - 10:18:34 (First Place Women’s 35-39)
6. Danielle Sullivan - 10:18:40
7. Jacqui Gordon - 10:31:53
8. Shandra Richardson - 10:32:34 (First Place Women’s 25-29)
9. Mimi Boyle - 10:33:57 (Second Place Women’s 35-39)
10. Natalie Groves - 10:36:45 (First Place Women’s 30-34)

Back on the men’s side, Pontano and Andersson were taking advantage of their 13-minute lead, but after 10 miles, the Spaniard had stretched his lead to five minutes over Andersson and 18 minutes over Hecht and the quick-chasing Czech, Petr Vabrousek, who had moved into fourth.

Through the half marathon and past the final turn-around at the 19-mile mark, Pontano continued in impressive fashion with a 14-minute lead on Andersson and Vabrousek who had moved into third. It was not to be Andersson’s day though, as he struggled through the final 6.5 miles of the run, walking the majority of the way.

Conversely, Pontano was able to cruise the final stretch back to town, capping off the day with a 3:07:18 marathon, finishing in 8:43:32, which was good enough for a 12-minute cushion over Vabrousek (8:55:20). Vabrousek was one of only four athletes to get under the three-hour marathon mark.

The best-placed American on the day was 29-year-old Will Ronco of Boulder, Colorado, who finished in fifth place with 9:02:32. Ronco flew under everyone’s radar and let a stream of professionals pass him on the first loop of the bike, knowing a properly-paced race would leave him fresh for the marathon and reeling in those who let it all go over those first 56 miles. Ronco pulled off a very impressive feat with nearly even splits during the bike leg (2:30:01 and 2:30:37), coming off in ninth place and moving into fifth through the marathon with a solid 3:04:22.

Equally impressive was B.J. Christensen, first-placed amateur male, who finished in 9:23:35 and in the process pulled off the fastest run of the day in 2:56:13.

Top 10 Men (Finish)
1. Francisco Pontano - 8:43:32
2. Petr Vabrousek - 8:55:20
3. Mathias Hecht - 8:56:33
4. Christian Brader - 8:58:10
5. Will Ronco - 9:02:32
6. Paul Fritzsche - 9:06:17
7. Dave Harju - 9:11:58
8. Alex McDonald - 9:13:04
9. Patrick Evoe - 9:14:18
10. Tim Snow - 9:18:38

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Brian Shea comes to Competitor with a wealth of experience in endurance sports as both an athlete and coach. He has been competing in all levels of endurance sports from 5K to Ironman to Ultra-marathon, including the Ironman Hawaii World Championships with a 9:31 personal best. On the coaching side, he is a certified coach and has worked with athletes ranging from beginners to professionals formulating training and sports nutrition programs for over 15 years. Brian is also the President/Owner of www.PersonalBestNutrition.com, a nutritional supplement resource specifically catering to the needs of endurance athletes, and he can be reached at Brian@PersonalBestNutrition.com.