The provisional start list for IRONMAN Lake Placid on 23 July – the last qualifying event for the men’s IRONMAN World Championship in Nice – has just been published.
Two spots are available and among those potentially looking for a place are Alistair Brownlee (GBR), Michael Weiss (AUT), Matt Russell (USA), Ben Hoffman (AUS), Josh Amberger (AUS) and Andreas Dreitz (GER).
Also on there are Joe Skipper (GBR), Cody Beals (CAN) and Matt Hanson (USA) but that trio are already qualified (full list here) – with reigning champion Beals having already said he won’t be heading to France in September.
Different approaches
The Canadian, who held off Weiss 12 months ago, has instead opted to defend his Lake Placid title before looking to lock down an early Kona 2024 place.
It remains to be seen whether double Olympic champion Brownlee heads Stateside – he booked his 2022 Kona place on what was then his final opportunity by winning IRONMAN Kalmar in Sweden.
And this season he’s returned from injury with a sixth place at the PTO European Open in Ibiza before winning an XTERRA event in the UK.
IRONMAN Switzerland this weekend had also been an option but the revised start list there shows a number of changes, with Brownlee, Daniel Baekkegard and Clement Mignon no longer on it.
Kona options running out too
Fellow Brit Skipper had been expected to head straight to Nice following his fifth place at an epic Challenge Roth but he revealed after that display that he will look to either take in Lake Placid or 70.3 Swansea (16 July) en route to the French Riviera.
Time is also running out for the pro women to seal their spots for Kona in October.
They have two more races (IRONMAN Kalmar and IRONMAN Mont Tremblant) after Lake Placid, for which the start list is headed by Sarah Crowley (AUS) and Jodie Robertson (USA) who are already Hawaii-bound, meaning decent opportunities for those names lower down.
Triathlon’s mid-season report card: Tim Don on who’s raising the bar this triathlon race season
