2 second places for Rachel Joyce in Antwerp and Swen Sundberg in Switzerland (25.07.2010)

Top results can be announced from the athletes of Abu Dhabi Triathlon Team at the races of the Ironman series in Belgium and Switzerland. Both results were not really expected.

Rachel was nervous at the starting line of Ironman 70.3 Antwerp. Though we have mid of the season the race was the first one of this year for Rachel as she hurt herself at the Abu Dhabi International Triathlon in March. She has already done some promising swim and time trial races but still the triathlon experience was missing. With her swim strength the first discipline went well. But on the bike she could not find her rhythm. Luckily on the run she started to feel better – helped by the fantastic support from locals and all the Brits out there and Rachel ran into second place behind local favourite Sofie Goos. That was a good (if rather late) start to her season and she is looking forward to Wiesbaden in 3 weeks.

Some hundreds kilometres south Swen Sundberg was ready to race Ironman Switzerland. The decision to compete in Zürich was made on short notice after he dropped out in Roth a week ago. The entire week he had some problems with his stomach. So Swen was not sure if he could do a proper race. But it was worth a try and already after the swim Swen was confident. He came out of the water with the leading group and he could get away with 3 other guys like the later winner, the Swiss Ronny Schildknecht. Swen could stay in the group up to kilometre 140 on the bike. Then his stomach problems started again and he could not keep the pace. On the running course the problems did not disappear. But his goal was to see the finish line and so he fought. At the second half marathon the machine Sundberg started working again. Just a few kilometres before the end he overtook the Swiss Mike Aigroz and he could cross the finish line as 2^nd. More than happy he said after the race: “After last week’s problems I would not have expected that result. Now I see that there was something positive about the drop out in Roth. Additionally I got a slot for Hawaii. I am already looking forward to the preparation with the team and to the race in October.”

The last team athlete who raced was Jan van Berkel. He set himself big goals for the ITU World Championship race in London. There the “who is who” of the short course triathlon scene was present. Jan was again able to finish the bike with the big leading group. But on the run it did not work this time. With problems he had to settle for finishing 46^th.