The women provided the most excitement. As usual super fish Haley Chura of the U.S. took the swim with a 20:01 split that gave her a 45 seconds lead on Radka Vodickova and 1:40 on Seymour and significantly, 4:21 on dangerous cyclist-runner Sarah Piampiano of the U.S.

After a women’s-best 2:20:49 bike split, Vodickova took a 7 seconds lead on Chura (women’s second-best 2:21:00 bike split) and 3:39 on Seymour, who hung within striking distance with a women’s sixth-fastest 2:23:15 bike split. Piampiano gained no ground with a 4th-fastest 2:22:53 bike split that left her 6:23 arrears.

Halfway through the 13.1 mile run, Kahlefeldt increased her lead to 1:13 on Chura but Seymour cut her deficit to 2:25 and seized the momentum. At the 16km mark, Seymout was rolling and took over second place from Chura and whittled Kahlefeldt’s lead to 55 seconds. Running 17 seconds per kilometer faster than Kahlefeldt, Seymour ran through Kahlefeldt with 2 kilometers to go.

After a blazing 1:17:15 run, Seymour finshedin 4:08:08 with a 31 seconds margin of victory over Kahlefeldt (women’s second best 1:21:25 run) and 2:50 over Chura, who took the final spot on the podium with a women’s 3rd-fastest 1:23:25 run. Piampiano closed hard with a 1:21:58 run but fell 4:51 behind Chura and had to be satisfied with 4th place.