(c) Lalo Badillo

An honourable End-of-Season

Michi finished in the Top 5 at the IRONMAN Cozumel and confirmed his reputation of being a hunter having started a memorable catch-up effort after the swim.

A delay before the start of the race due to a storm that caused large waves and a rotation of the current made the warmup a somewhat longer process. The call to delay the start was made very late by the organizers and ended up being a 30–40-minute delay.

Michi caught a good group for the swim, with which he got out of the water about five minutes behind the lead group - a solid swim under unusually difficult conditions.

The roads were still very wet for the bike split. Michi had strong legs from the beginning and was able to knock off some competitors who had come out of the transition zone ahead him.

He wanted to detach himself asap from the group with 350-400 watts on the first 40 kilometers and also attacked the front a few times, but meaningful progress was not possible. The subsequent "Cozumel group ride" was a pragmatic choice under the circumstances. Michi shared most of the lead work with the Germans Dominik Sowieja and Felix Hentschel on the rest of the bike split, losing a lot of time in the hot and humid conditions.

 

Consistency is key

In T2, he was around nine minutes off the podium. Together with the Swiss Jan Van Berkel, Michi quickly pushed towards the front on the first round of the run. The running conditions were hard, feeling like 33 degrees and 80% humidity. However, the Lower Austrian athlete managed the heat very well and always stayed in eighth or ninth place. He managed his run perfectly and was able to move well up the field with a very constant marathon. The km splits were always between 3:50-4:20 minutes and he was able to ease forward into fifth place with some overtaking manoeuvres.

Even when running, his legs felt very fit and Michi always had more in reserve. His primary struggle was with the heat. At 7:56h, he achieved a steady Top 5 ranking just over six minutes behind winner Magnus Ditlev from Denmark. Congratulations on this performance!

Michi is ultimately very satisfied with how his race on the Mexican island panned out. Now a well-deserved break is just around the corner and the Gumpoldskirchen athlete plans to shut down the system completely to then restart the new year full of motivation but with some changes!

 

Hasta luego, amigos!

pic gallery from Cozumel