Alanis Siffert Steals the Show with Huge Win at Challenge Roth 2026

All week the talk has been about a British showdown between Lucy Charles-Barclay (who only entered the race at the beginning of the week) and Kat Matthews, with more talk that there was potential for a third Brit to join the podium in the form of Daisy Davies.

That script didn’t actually work out, though, thanks to Switzerland’s Alanis Siffert, who blasted through the day’s fastest bike and run splits to dominate the day, improving on her third place finish from a year ago and becoming the youngest winner of Challenge Roth and the second youngest winner of the full-distance race here. (Anyone guess the youngest? Paula Newby-Fraser won IRONMAN Germany here in 1986.)

Initially things were going according to plan as Charles-Barclay, the sport’s premier swimmer, opened up a big gap in the water, coming out in 50:23, a little under two minutes ahead of the chase group that included Siffert, Davies, Fenella Langridge and full-distance rookie Caroline Pohle. Matthews would exit the water a shade over six minutes behind Charles-Barclay.

Once out on the bike it was Siffert who would make a bold statement as she flew towards the lead and by the 26 km point of the ride she was already in front. Davies and Pohle would also ride their way up to Charles-Barclay, setting up a three-woman chase group. Matthews never seemed to be in her usual form and would steadily lose ground on the three women ahead of her. Halfway through the bike Siffert was out in front with Pohle, Charles-Barclay and Davies sitting between 59 and 70 seconds back, with Matthews at 8:36 behind.

By the end of the bike Siffert was still a minute up on Pohle and Charles-Barclay, with Davies 6:18 down in fourth and Matthews 12:27 back in fifth. The race had very much become a five-woman affair by this point – Langridge would hit T2 in sixth, just over 25 minutes behind Siffert.

Once on the run the question became whether or not Siffert could hold off the 2023 Kona champ and reigning 70.3 world champ (not to mention the winner here in 2019) through the marathon. Pohle started the marathon off running with Charles-Barclay and stayed close through the first 10 km, but would start to fade at that point. Siffert was doing anything but fade as her lead grew to just under three minutes at the half way point and was just under four minutes at 30 km. From that point there was no doubt Siffert was on her way to a special day, which was confirmed with her impressive 8:09:09 finish – considerably faster than her 8:41 clocking last year.

Charles-Barclay took second thanks to an impressive 2:50 run split, while Davies hung on for third, with Matthews taking fourth after catching Pohle in the last couple of kilometres of the run.