A great run helped American Jarrod Shoemaker to win the 2009 Dextro Energy ITU Triathlon event in Hamburg, Germany. Aussie Brad Kahlefeldt made a valiant effort to reel in Shoemaker but had to settle for the runner-up spot.
Neither Alistair Brownlee nor Javier Gomez were racing in Hamburg, but the start list was quite impressive nonetheless. The opening 1500m swim saw Richard Varga of the Czech Republik exit the waters of the Alster first and he was followed closely by Aurelien Raphael of France and Joshua Maeder of Australia.
Out on the bike course, Germany's Maik Petzold tried to escape with Canada's Paul Tichelaar and Raphael early on, but that break was caught by the chasing pack. Tichelaar managed to get into another break with Mark Fretta from the United States, Dominik Berger from Austria and Christian Prochnow and those 4 athletes worked well together and managed to gain a 1:20 minute lead coming into the second transition. 2007 ITU World Champion Daniel Unger who had won his title in Hamburg, but today was not going to be his day. The popular German flatted early on and quickly dropped out of contention, but decided to finish the race anyway.
Prochnow quickly charged into the lead on the run, giving the German fans reason to be exited, but he had a hard time shaking Tichelaar. A bit further back, the Olympic podium from Beijing, Jan Frodeno, Simon Whitfield were chasing hard with Kris Gemmell, Bevan Docherty, Brad Kahlefeldt, Maik Petzold, Stefan Justus and Jarrod Shoemaker. Surprisingly it was Shoemaker who surged out of the chasing bunch and set out to run down the leaders. By the halfway point of the run Shoemaker was in the lead and now it was Kahlefeldt who tried to hunt him down. Shoemaker though held on to the win with an impressive 29:37 run and his first major win. Kahlefeldt had to settle for second place and Alexander Brukhankov came across the line in third place.
"It was an unbelievable race, and I just wanted to come out and do well. I actually wasn’t planning on racing in Hamburg but two weeks ago at the last round in Kitzbühel I dropped out in the cold conditions and then decided to come up here," said Schoemaker. "I really had to work in the swim, but felt great on the bike and then just opened up on the run. This race is the race other races look up to, and with such an awesome crowd and 9000 age group triathletes competing in the morning it’s a special place. I decided that today I would just run all out, I’ve sat in the pack too much this year so to pull off the win is great!"
Hamburg DC Dextro Energy Triathlon - ITU World Championship
Hamburg, Germany / July 26
1.5km swim, 40km bike, 10km run
Top 10 Elite Men
1. Jarrod Shoemaker (USA) 1:44:06
2. Brad Kahlefeldt (AUS) 1:44:14
3. Alexander Brukhanokov (RUS) 1:44:16
4. Steffen Justus (GER) 1:44:21
5. Bevan Docherty (NZL) 1:44:25
6. Maik Petzold (GER) 1:44:29
7. Kris Gemmell (NZL) 1:44:29
8. Dmitry Polyansky (RUS) 1:44:41
9. Simon Whitfield (CAN) 1:44:49
10. Jan Frodeno (GER) 1:44:55
