The final competition of the triathlon season in Carinthia at the Klopeinersee!
After the Corona-related cancellation in the previous year, the triathlon over the half distance could take place again this year in beautiful autumn weather. Babsi, Christian Hanschitz and our new team rocket, Thomas Messner were at the start and wanted to have their say about the top positions.
Thomas started in front with the elite, Babsi and Christian in the rolling start 3 minutes behind. All of them had a very good swim split and were able to compete in the front. Babsi came out of the water in second place, 90 seconds behind the leader, while Thomas kept up well with the elite field and was fourth on the bike course. Christian got out of the lake with the sixth fastest swim time overall.
On the bike, everyone was pushing hard from the start, with Babsi catching up with the leader on the first of four laps and then pulling away by another 2 minutes. Turn by turn she continuously extended her lead. Thomas was in 3rd place after the 90 kilometers and started to catch up with the runner-up on the difficult course with several meters of altitude around the lake. The leading pro, Thomas Angerer, was unfortunately out of reach. Christian had a birthday on that day, unfortunately this did not bring him luck, on the contrary, often you also have bad luck: tire burst at km 65, tube changed and the same again right after - he therefore unfortunately had to give up the race.
Thomas ran the fastest run split, but it was not quite enough for 2nd place, at least for the time being...
Babsi won the women's race after a very good half marathon, also at least for the time being...
The solution to the riddle: the runner-up in the men's race, just like Babsi, disregarded the overtaking ban in the heat of the moment in the last lap and therefore both were disqualified. For Babsi and the so far second place of course bitter, for Thomas however very well, place 2 overall can be really respectable!
