Mary Beth Ellis wins Ironman Mont-Tremblant Triathlon

Mary Beth Ellis has announced to the triathlon world that she is in fine form heading into the Ironman World Championship, continuing her undefeated streak of Ironman victories outside of Kona. Ellis raced to a comfortable victory despite a talented field of women assembling, in an attempt to break the American’s dominance, and to race for valuable Kona qualifying points.

With a 51:43 swim Ellis trailed only former ITU star Liz Blatchford and super fish Haley Chura of the USA out of the water. Despite this it didn’t take long for Ellis to take control of the race, posting a 4:58:18 bike split, the fastest of the day. Only third placed Anja Beranek came within five minutes of this time with a 5:00:30. Ellis backed up her sub five hour bike with a 3:12:47 marathon, running to a comfortable victory and saving some fuel for the big dance in Kona.

Rebekah Keat of Australia crossed the line in second place behind Ellis, in a repeat of last years result at the Ironman US Championship (which was held in New York). Keat had stated leading into the race that her goal was to go one place better this year, but it wasn’t to be, with Ellis proving far too strong for anyone on the day. Despite this Keat has stamped her ticket to Kona and will be happy nonetheless.

Third placed Anja Beranek (DEU) finished only 31 seconds back of Keat, having faded during the marathon. Beranek has raced a busy schedule in recent months, with a disappointing resulting in Ironman Frankfurt seeing her back up to race Ironman Switzerland just three weeks later. A decision Beranek describes as plan b certainly paid off, earning her first Ironman victory. Despite this moment of celebration, Beranek devised a plan c, which involved qualifying for Kona. Plan C saw Beranek race another Ironman again, just 21 days later, in an attempt to gain valuable KPR points. “Impossible is nothing, I’ll keep my fingers crossed” was the attitude Beranek started the race with yesterday, and it sure looks to have paid off.

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