Marino Vanhoenacker of Belgium and Jodie Swallow of Great Britain won the men’s and women’s titles at Spec-Savers Ironman 70.3 South Africa Sunday in East London, South Africa.

The Men

Vanhoenacker combined a 5th-best 27:01 swim, a race-best 2:18:01 bike and a second-best 1:17:20 half marathon to finish in 4:06:25 with a 6:31 margin of victory over runner-up Ronnie Schildknecht of Switzerland and 12:12 over third place Domenico Passuello of Italy.

Vanhoenacker is coming off a season with one brilliant highlight – breaking Luc Van Lierde’s 15-year-old Ironman world-best with a 7:45:58 performance at Austria, the 9th Ironman victory of his career. Vanhoenacker also finished 2nd at the Abu Dhabi International, just 17 seconds back of fellow Belgian Frederik Van Lierde. But his season ended with disappointment as he failed to crack the top 20 at Kona.

The Women

Swallow led wire-to-wire, combing a women’s race-best swim of 26:56 swim, a second-best 2:36:41 bike and 4th-best 1:31:14 run to hit the line in 4:39:01 with a 4:02 margin of victory over Lucie Zelenkova of the Czech Republic and a 7:12 margin over third-place Tine Deckers of Belgium.

Swallow, the 2009 ITU long distance World Champion and the 2010 Ironman 70.3 World Champion, made an encouraging start to 2012 after a discouraging 2011 in which she was plagued by a debilitating plantar fascia tear that struck after her January win at East London.

Throughout the rest of the year, Swallow was forced to drop out of several races on the run after leading through the swim and bike.

Writing in her blog, Swallow said the season was most painful: “It is outrageous to think that my foot hurt every time I stepped for almost a year…outrageous for a ‘normal’ person –incomprehensible for someone trying to run marathons, track sessions and up mountains four times a week.”

Citing her determination to take enough time off to completely recover from her plantar fascia tear, Swallow left famed coach Brett Sutton and Team TBB and started this season without sponsors.

Spec-Savers Ironman 70.3 South Africa
East London, South Africa
January 22, 2012
S 1.9 k / B 90k / R 21.2 k

Results

Men

1. Marino Vanhoenacker (BEL) 4:06:25
2. Ronnie Schildknecht (SUI) 4:12:56
3. Domenico Passuello (ITA) 4:18:37
4. Mark Threlfall (GBR) 4:19:46
5. Kent Horner (RSA) 4:21:34
6. Joel Jameson (GBR) 4:22:45
7. Edo Van Der Meer (RSA) 4:26:20
8. Balazs Csoke (HUN) 4:29:56
9. Raoul De Jongh (RSA) 4:31:38 * M30-34
10. Michael Davidson (RSA) 4:32:21

Women

1. Jodie Swallow (GBR) 4:39:01
2. Lucie Zelenkova (CZE) 4:43:56
3. Tine Deckers (BEL) 4:46:13
4. Claire Horner (RSA) 4:51:39
5. Annah Watkinson (RSA) 4:58:38 * F30-34
6. Jeanni Seymour (RSA) 5:00:58 * F18-24
7. Susie Hignett (GBR) 5:02:02
8. Natasha Gorrie (RSA) 5:02:37
9. Samantha Ferreira (RSA) 5:03:47 * F30-34
10. Lynette Van Der Merwe (RSA) 5:04:48 * F25-29