Lisa Norden may have lost the Olympic triathlon by a heart-stopping 2 inches at the line, but her dominating $151,500-plus repeat victory at the Hy-Vee Elite Cup, 5150 U.S. Championship race in Des Moines, Iowa today may assuage some of the heartbreak.
In the race where the ITU draft legal stars meet the non-drafting aces head to head, Norden proved she is at the top of the game in both disciplines as she overcame a 51 seconds deficit after the swim and a time-consuming mechanical adjustment during a 2nd-best bike split. As Haskins stretched out a half minute lead, Norden kept her cool with a race-fastest run that propelled her past Haskins on the first lap of the run and on to the finish in 2:01:59.
Norden’s Hy-Vee win was the cherry on top of a nearly perfect month of racing. After her split second loss to Nicola Spirig at the London Olympics, she scored a resounding home country win at the ITU World Triathlon Series sprint race at Stockholm last weekend and then seized her second straight big check at Hy-Vee.
“I don’t think these last five weeks could have been any better, despite the .09 seconds or whatever in London,” she told Hy-Vee media. “Today definitely makes up for it.”
Haskins posted the fastest swim in 19:43 which was 27 seconds faster than the next best split. Haskins held firm to the lead through the bike and hit T2 with a 16 seconds lead over Norden.
Haskins admitted the 90-degree heat got to her. “It was brutally hot, and the helmet made it feel like a sauna,” she told Hy-Vee media. “I knew Lisa was right behind me because I started the run conservatively. This course was hard.”
Norden’s chase was made tougher as her handlebars came loose and she lost time fixing them at a designated wheel stop. “I was so stupid there,” Norden told Hy-Vee media. “We made a thousand adjustments [before the race] but the bars came loose and I lost 40 seconds. I had to start over chasing her down.”
Haskins can also take some solace for missing qualifying for the U.S. Olympic team as she won the first two primes of the swim and the four primes of the bike leg before succumbing to Norden’s run – then holding firm to the $75,000 second place prize money as well as the $30,900 in primes for a total payoff of $105,900.
Jodie Stimpson of Great Britain, also looking for some redemption after narrowly missing Great Britain’s 2012 Olympic team, took 3rd , 47 seconds behind Haskins and garnering a check of $50,000.
Super cyclists Angela Naeth and 2011 Ironman 70.3 World Champion Melissa Rollison overcame 26th and 27th place swim finishes and 2:40 deficits to advance to 9th (-36 seconds) and 12th (-1:45) after sizzling bike splits. On the final lap of the run, Rollison redlined her way to pass Naeth for 4th, but the Canadian then came back in the stretch to finish 4th in 2:03:46 as an exhausted Rollison took 5th in 2:04:02.
The star-studded field missed non-starters who included Olympic champion Nicola Spirig, last year’s Hy-Vee 4th place finisher Nikki Butterfield and last year’s Hy-Vee runner-up Mirinda Carfrae.
Hy-Vee Elite Cup – 5150 U.S. Championship
Des Moines, Iowa
September 2, 2012
S 1.5k / B 40k / R 10k
Elite Women’s results
1. Lisa Norden (SWE) 2:01:59 -- $151,500
2. Sarah Haskins (USA) 2:02:50 -- $75,000
3. Jodie Stimpson (GBR) 2:03:37 -- $50,000
4. Angela Naeth (CAN) 2:03:46 -- $25,000
5. Melissa Rollison (AUS) 2;04:02 -- $20,000
6. Kelly Williamson (USA) 2;04:26 -- $18,000
7. Laura Bennett (USA) 2:04:30 -- $16,000
8. Liz Blatchford (GBR) 2;04:44 - $14,000
9. Radka Vodickova (CZE) 2:05:53 -- $12,000
10. Daniela Ryf (SUI) 2:06:04 -- $10,000
