Mary Beth Ellis of the U.S. and Igor Amorelli of Brazil won Ironman Maastricht-Limburg in the Netherlands.
Women
In a spectacular return to form in her first race back after losing months to Lyme disease, Ellis created a 2:30 lead with her women’s-best 48:18 swim, and increased her margin to 22:46 with a women’s-best 5:14:41 bike split on a tough course with 1,400 meters of climbing. Ellis polished off the day with a women’s 2nd-fastest 3:17:08 marathon which brought her to the finish in 9:24:42, with a 26:25 margin of victory over Saleta Castro Noqueria of Spain (women’s-best 3:04:47 run) and 38:48 over 3rd-place Tineke van den Berg of Netherlands.
With time lost during her Lyme disease layoff, Ellis fell to 57th in the pro women KPR standings as of the July 24 first round which admits 28 slots plus places for the five Ironman Regional Champions. With her 2,000 point victory, Ellis advanced to 4,900 points and 33rd in the KPR ranking. With high-ranking pros such as Rachel Joyce out due to pregnancy and Liz Blatchford out due to injury, Ellis is in an excellent position to earn one of the seven remaining Kona spots to be allotted in August.
Men
Amorelli led the swim, came within 1 second of the lead after the bike leg, and led all the way on the marathon. The Brazilian finished in 8:28:17 with a 5:27 margin of victory over Mark Oude Bennink of Netherlands and 7:40 over 3rd-place finisher Bas Diederen, also of Netherlands.
Amorelli combined a race-best 46:16 swim, a 2nd-fastest 4:40:41 bike split and a 3rd-best 2:57:15 run to take the win. The key to his victory was the bike leg in which he outpaced runner-up Bennink by 6:45. Amorelli did not simply out ride Bennink, as the runner-up lost 5:39 fixing a technical problem with his rear wheel.
Defending champion Diederen out biked Amorelli by 8 seconds but fell to 3rd place when his 3:04:27 run gave back 7:12 on the run to Amorelli and 8:19 to Bennink.
Amorelli’s victory capped a comeback from a broken arm suffered in an April bike crash which required pins and plating.
In the critical race to qualify for Kona, Amorelli added 2,000 Kona Pro Ranking (KPR) points to advance from 107th to 53rd in the standings. With 47 of the top men in KPR points achieving Kona qualification as of the July 24 KPR cutoff – including winners of the Ironman regional championships and winners of the last five Kona races who validated their entries with an Ironman finish – Amorelli is in prime position to make the Kona field. His current KPR point total of 3,410 is 6th among the unqualified pro men chasing the 10 Kona spots still available in the August 21 final KPR rankings.
Ironman Maastricht-Limburg
Limburg, Netherlands
July 31, 2016
S 2.4 mi. / B 112 mi. / R 26.2 mi.
Women
1. Mary Beth Ellis (USA) 9:24:42
2. Saleta Castro Noqueria (ESP) 9:51:07
3. Tineke van den Berg (NED) 10:03:30
4. Sarissa De Vries (NED) 10:05:50
5. Pleuni Hooijman (NED 10:10:20 *F30-34
6. Estelle-Marie Kieffer (FRA) 10:19:41 *F40-44
7. Fiona Ford (AUS) 10:27:50 * F45-49
8. Katrine Brock (DEN) 10:30:43 *F18-24
9. Mélissa Lapp (FRA) 10:31:46 *F25-29
10. Beate Zschorlich (GER) 10:36:27 *F40-44
Men
1. Igor Amorelli (BRA) 8:28:17
2. Mark Oude Bennink (NED) 8:33:44
3. Bas Diederen (NED) 8:35:57
4. Erik-Simon Strijk (NED) 8:53:15
5. Diego Van Looy (BEL) 8:55:05
6. Mike Schifferle (SUI) 9:04:39
7. Michael Van Cleven (BEL) 9:06:42
8. Lucky Berlage (BEL) 9:15:17
9. James Curran (IRL) 9:15:58 *M30-34
10. Frederik Waer (BEL) 9:22:24 *M30-34
