Alistair Brownlee had a dominant comeback performance to convincingly win the ITU World Triathlon Series race in Kitzbühel.
Racing hard all the way to the finish, there was no waiting around for younger brother, Jonathan, who finished second. Britain’s David McNamee also finished inside the top ten, his best ever result.
Alistair Brownlee, who has missed the early part of the season with an Achilles injury, had a great 1,500m swim and set out like a rocket from the first transition. He set up a break with Jonathan and Russian, Ivan Vasiliev on the bike, which lasted two laps before Stuart Hayes took control of the bike leg and delivered the brothers to the start of the run in a strong position.
Alistair took the lead immediately, as Jonathan edged away Javier Gomez for the silver medal.
Alistair said: “I didn’t really know what my form would be like. I know I’ve trained really hard for the last couple of months and I’ve been real tired the last couple of days, so it was about whether I was going to recover from that in time or not.
“We tried to push the early part of the bike as much as we could and see what happened, we couldn’t get away but I think it was important we hurt a lot of people’s legs.
“It’s nice to be back on the podium, and it’s fantastic to go a one-two, that’s what we always try to get. To go that quick; I couldn’t ask much more.”
Jonathan added: “It’s the way we race, we get on the bike and ride hard, and then Alistair just got on the run and killed everyone. Having Alistair back is like having things back to normal. It makes things much harder, he destroyed everyone today.”
David McNamee had the best performance of his career in ninth. The result moves him up to twelfth overall in the ITU World Triathlon Series, which continues through the summer to the Grand Final in New Zealand in October. Aaron Harris also had a good finish in 19th.
London Olympian, Vicky Holland, was forced to drop out of the women’s race yesterday with a mechanical issue on the bike. Jodie Stimpson also withdrew with stomach problems on the run. Vanessa Raw finished 26th, as Switzerland’s Nicola Spirig claimed an impressive victory.
Elite men’s results:
1. Alistair Brownlee GBR 1:50:13
2. Jonathan Brownlee GBR 1:51:02
3. Javier Gomez ESP 1:51:18
9. David McNamee GBR 1:52:10
19. Aaron Harris GBR 1:53:29
29. Stuart Hayes GBR 1:55:09
31. Phil Wolfe GBR 1:56:13
36. Mark Buckingham GBR 1:58:18
37. Ritchie Nicholls GBR 1:58:26
Photo: Janos Schmidt