Dan Lorang is no stranger to success, having coached world class athletes such as Germans Jan Frodeno and Anne Haug to IRONMAN World Championship titles in recent years.

Last month, the Head of Performance at BORA-Hansgrohe watched on as another one of his athletes, Lucy Charles-Barclay, took the win in Kona, ending a string of second place finishes on the Big Island for the Brit.

A man of science, Lorang recently revealed on The Greg Bennett Show that Charles-Barclay’s form, along with some trusted statistics of previous successes, gave him an inkling of what was to come.

“The numbers don’t lie”

Recounting how both Haug and Frodeno had won on the Big Island in their third season under his guidance, Lorang said he had joked to Charles-Barclay before the race that as this was her third season as his athlete, the same would be true for her.

“For some fun, before the race, I spoke with her [Charles-Barclay] some weeks before Kona and said statistically, she will win Kona, because when I work three years with guys, like Anne and Jan, they win there and the numbers don’t lie!”

Going into more details about Charles-Barclay’s preparation ahead of her record breaking performance, Lorang points out that as well as having the stats on her side, the Brit put in a tremendous amount of hard work at home to sufficiently prepare for race day.

“She had a really good training block, six weeks, with heat adaptation and heat training, which are two different things, with Reece [Barclay] on the ground controlling the intensity with lactate monitors and heart rate monitors.

“When she went to Kona, after the first pre-race session, I saw that it was very good in terms of heart rate in relation to power and that was the first time I thought okay, this could be the day she is able to do it.

“I knew she would be able to have a good performance, a really good performance, but if it’s a winning performance, you never know, because you never know what the other people are doing.”