Yvonne van Vlerken defends her title at Ironman Cozumel and wins with 9:07:08h in a world class time.
This was probably Yvonne’s most tactical and best Ironman to date.
Yvonne van Vlerken successfully defended her title at the 2nd edition of the Ironman on the Caribbean island of Cozumel.
Although American Amanda Stevens, fourth at the Ironman 70.3 World Championships Clearwater a few weeks ago, lead the women´s field with more than 10 minutes on Yvonne van Vlerken out of the water. Van Vlerken succeeded to surprise her competitors with the 5th swimming time (56:59 min) in the ladies-professional field and did show that she is successfully working hard to erase her reputation as a weak swimmer.
On the bike Yvonne van Vlerken could show her strength (4:51:56h), but had to yield to the quickest ladies bike split to the excellent cyclist Tyler Stewart/USA (4:47:24h). Stewart came off the bike a good 1 minute ahead which changed to 2:30min as van Vlerken took her time to change into her fresh white Skinfit-Swimsuit for the run (which the Mexican fans honored thankfully).
Tyler Stewart fought up to the second lap to keep the lead. Yvonne van Vlerken did not make the same mistake again which did cost her better results twice at the Sparkasse Ironman European Championship in Frankfurt. She was patient while being confident about her run strength. Then from the half marathon point on, the Dutchwoman, who resides in Austria, turned up the speed and outdistanced Tyler Stewart by 16 minutes and Amanda Stevens by even 19 minutes until the end.
Quote Yvonne: “My dream has come true. I wanted to defend this title for so many reasons. From an athletic point of view I could not be more contented about my performance. I could control the run and saw how important it is not to react on the attacks of others but rather stick to my own tactics throughout the day. This was an important experience for my future in long-distance racing. The race was again a fantastic experience. My thanks goes to the organizers and the great people of
Cozumel!“