Ironman New York will follow Melbourne’s lead with one of the best fields outside of Kona

New York is set to put on an Ironman show this weekend and there are plenty of Australians and Kiwis racing there. Below is the final start list with the exception of any athletes that have pulled out but haven’t informed WTC. Jordan Rapp is likely to be one of the main favourites along with a number of the top ten guys. At this stage of the season and with Kona being the main focus of most of the favourites it would be impossible to try to pick somone for IM NYC.

It is one of those fields that is going to be really hard to pick. Australia’s Paul Ambrose won Ironman Australia earlier this year ahead of Tim Berkel with a swim bike combo that gave him a huge buffer over Berkel going in to the run. Ambrose has been racing very strongly in the 70.3 series in the US. With two seconds at Syracuse and Kansas 70.3s in June Ambrose showed that he has kept his from from earlier this year. He will be one of the favourites.

Luke Bell last raced an Ironman in Cairns and after a good swim / bike ended up going for an afternoon stroll with Mitch Anderson for a casual 3:44 marathon. For the record Mitch ran 3:34 but they did most of the run together and finished together. Bell had a good race in Melbourne earlier this year. He finished 7th in 8:10:38 with a 2:52 marathon.

The big sexy Chris McDonald is also racing and as always will be a strong contender.

Bryan Rhodses is down to race but he will instead be behind the microphone this weekend along with Australian Ironwoman legend Michellie Jones and Matt Lieto. Greg Welch who would normally commentate at an event like this is still in London taking Eddie through the finer details of the sport of triathlon. He could be a while.

Jason Shortis will be racing Ironman number 398. Shortis was 3rd this year at Ironman Australia and has also raced in Melbourne and Ironman Cairns. In Melbourne he had a slower than normal marathon. We are used to Shortis running around the sub 2:55 mark with a 2:52 at Ironman Australia. Melbourne was a 3:22. The Cairns run was 3:06.

In the women’s race Australia’s Rebekah Keat will be out to make amends after a possible win was snatched from her in June this year at Ironman Cairns. The defending champ was leading the race and on paper had the run to take it out when her calf blew up 4kms in to the run. Keat has been building her run back up to where it was. She had a solid 5th at the Muncie 70.3 and a 6th at Vineman.

Kate Bevilaqua is also racing and has two 70.3 seconds this year at WA and New Zealand. Bevilaqua won Ironman WA in 2010 and has the fire power to go well.

Current Ironman Australia champ and runner up to Keat at last year’s Challenge Cairns, Michelle Mitchell is also racing at New York. Look out for one of the biggest smiles in triathlon to put in a solid race with her trademark strong run.

Christie Sym is also racing and after getting to the bottom of some health issues that plagued her season last year we should see a solid race this weekend.

New Zealand’s Michelle Bremer won Ironman Western Australia last year in her first crack at that distance. Since then she has been building her race experience over the distance.

The favourites for the women’s race are many. In addition to Keat, Bevilaqua and Mitchelle we should see the following women at the front: Mary Beth Ellis, Amy Marsh, Dede Griesbauer, Heleen bij de Vaate, Heather Gollnick and Lucie Zelenkova all will have the opportunity this weekend to take out the race.