Matt Hanson Finally Makes it to Roth. Can He Ride Fast Enough to Stay in Contention for a Big Day?

Photos: Kevin Mackinnon

Matt Hanson’s resume is jam-packed with IRONMAN wins, but one thing that’s missing is a top finish (or, in fact, a finish at all) at Challenge Roth. The American is looking to change that tomorrow with his first appearance here in Roth. We caught up with the six-time IRONMAN champion shortly after he racked his bike in transition today.

Slowtwitch.com: Matt Hanson – first time in Roth. What took you so long? 

Matt Hanson: Exactly! I got to spectate here in 2019, and I’ve wanted to get on the start line ever since. I planned on doing it when COVID arrived and then just wasn’t able to to make it work out after that. 

This might not be as competitive a field as we’ve seen here in Roth, but the field here is always stacked.  

I think there’s a lot of newcomers here that we have no idea how they’re going to perform, and they’ve done really well at other distances. So, you have got to assume they’re going to figure it out pretty quick. And if they do it in their first race, it could be a really, really surprisingly stacked field, I guess. And there’s a couple of guys who are here just starting their season off, whether they had injuries or whatever. So, they’re fresh and that’s always a bit of a wild card, so you never know what you’re going to get here. The conditions look beautiful, so you do know that people are going to get rewarded by going out and being crazy early on. Someone’s going to crack, but people are going to get rewarded by doing that. 

There’s always people who crack here, it seems. You are renowned a great runner, but I’m guessing its even more important here for you to have a strong bike.  

Yeah. I mean, having a great run is nothing if it’s not preceded by a good swim and bike. So, I’ve got to do the work early on in the water to to put myself in the right place. 

That makes the day a whole lot easier, so that’s the focus on the day, and then whatever happens. I’ve just got to put myself in a position where a good run actually means something, and then go out and get it done. 

It looks like a non-wetsuit swim. Good news or bad news for you? 

Pretty much indifferent. I mean, everybody goes a little bit faster in the swim (with a wetsuit), so the gaps might be a little bit smaller, but historically I’ve had more low back issues on the bike after a wetsuit swim. So, yeah, I might lose a couple extra seconds to the leaders, but hopefully I can make that up by being in a better position on the bike. 

What’s a successful Roth for you? 

I think anybody that comes here dreams about pouring beer on their head at the end of the race, and you’ve got to earn that. You can’t just do it for the picture. You have to earn the picture. I mean, that’s the goal. There’s a lot of smaller goals to to lead me to that point.  

And where does this fit into a season in which you have a bunch of IRONMAN events, too? 

Well, it would have worked out fine if I weren’t to have got ‘hit in the face’ early in the year. I went to South Africa and ended up getting sick. So, then I had to add Cairns three weeks ago and to go after the points. (Hanson would finish fifth there.) I’m not so worried about feeling good for this one. But, Lake Placid in two weeks is going to feel pretty rough. But at least I was able to have a good day, a decent day in Cairns, and that opens up the options.  

We also managed to grab some shots of Hanson’s bike, which we profiled last year heading into Kona. There are a few changes to his new set up.

Hanson has switched out the Drag Zero aero bars he used in Kona for the Fast TT model.

As in Kona, he’s running the DT Swiss ARC 1400 80mm front wheel.

But here in Roth he gets run the ARC 1100 Disc rear wheel. He’s still using Shimano Dura Ace components.

He’s still using the ISM PN3.0 saddle, but now there are two water bottle cages attached – in Kona he had a single cage attached.

All smiles as he gets ready to take on the speedy Roth course.

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