Laura Philipp suggested the first-ever full-distance sub-eight hours time by a woman could be possible at IRONMAN Hamburg in the future – with one proviso!
German superstar Philipp smashed the previous best time for an IRONMAN-branded race when she clocked 8:03:13 on Sunday after an epic battle battle with Kat Matthews.
Philipp of course had beaten her British rival to win a first IRONMAN World Championship crown in Nice last year but this latest renewal was arguably a level up even on that.
They were locked together until the closing stages of the run as the previous best IRONMAN time – Matthews’ 8:10:34 in Texas in April – was destroyed by both of them.
‘Absolutely mental’
And speaking afterwards to Paul Kaye on the live broadcast, Philipp said: “Yeah, it was absolutely mental. We were glued together for the entire race. It was super tough and for a long time it looked like Kat would run away with it.
“But I just tried to be calm and patient because a marathon is a long game. And luckily it paid off, I let her go a little bit and just did my own thing and the crowd was crazy.
“I hope you guys could see it from back home, they were screaming so loud. I think it was really next level, the cheering here on the course. So that definitely helped me big time to go all out on the last lap. And when I overtook Kat I couldn’t believe it.”
‘I need to lie down’
Hamburg has a couple of super-long transitions and when Kaye put it to her that but for them, a time of under eight hours could have been under threat, Philipp agreed.
“Yeah, I think so. Hamburg, if you want us to go sub eight, you have to do something about the long transitions!”
Philipp took 3:39 at T1 and then 2:51 at T2 as she went incredibly close to Anne Haug’s fastest full-distance triathlon time of 8:02:38 from Challenge Roth last year, though she did just beat Haug’s fastest-ever marathon time with her 2:38:27 knocking 25 seconds off that mark.
It was a remarkable display by both her and Matthews – as well as Norway’s Solveig Løvseth who obliterated the previous record by an IRONMAN debutant as she took third.
And Philipp added: “Right now I’m still speechless. I need to lie down – I’m really done but also super, super proud.
“It’s still very early but of course this is a big boost and I will take it and hopefully recover well and then continue to build strong towards Kona in October.”
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