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After last year's rains flooded parts of the run course, the 2009 Ironman Kansas 70.3 stayed mostly dry and fast thanks to cloudy mild temperatures and light winds.

After a sixth place thrashing at the Olympic distance Columbia Triathlon a few weeks prior, Chrissie Wellington was relieved to pull out a dominating win in 4:14:52. But she took even greater pleasure in her disaster-free NASCAR-style 4-minute pit stop to replace a flat, demonstrating that her endless practice mastering the deployment of the CO2 canister to inflate the tube had not been in vain.

On the men's side, Luke Bell, Tim O'Donnell,Paul Matthews and Stephen Hackett broke away on the bike. O'Donnell made a brave move to lead the run until Luke Bell ran him down with a mile and a half to go and finished in a swift 3:49:35.

All in all, a good hit out for all concerned.