Gustav Iden, who won the IRONMAN World Championship two years ago when it was last held in Kona, saw his chances of a repeat impacted by a penalty for littering on the bike today (Saturday).
Penalties had looked likely in the first half of the 112-mile bike section as there was a near 20-man chase group trying to keep tabs on leaders Sam Laidlow and Magnus Ditlev.
But with RaceRanger draft-detection technology being used for the first time for the men’s race in Hawaii, drafting penalties had looked the most likely source.
However Iden was shown a yellow card for “unintentional littering”. That meant he had to spend 60 seconds in the penalty tent to add to an already hefty deficit.
Losing contact
Iden had lost 3:31 in the swim after losing touch with the front group and – despite a much discussed new aero position on the bike – that only went out.
At the 31-mile point he was 6:53 behind Laidlow and at the 50-mile mark it was over nine minutes.
And unfortunately that trend continued – he was 20 minutes behind by T2 and would exit the race before the halfway point on the run.
Iden has had a challenging two years – both on a professional and personal level – and had suggested in the build-up that a victory on his Kona return would likely be beyond him.
Double trouble for Team Norway
And the sanction came at around the same time that things were going wrong for Iden’s fellow Norwegian and great friend Kristian Blummenfelt.
Big Blu had moved up to third but a shocking bout of vomiting saw him lose what must have been pretty much all of his nutrition.
That’s something he’s fought back from before but such was the extent of it – and the time lost as he dropped down the field – that he would never get back in the mix.
However he battled all the way to the finish line as he came home in 35th place behind impressive winner Patrick Lange who claimed a third Kona title.
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