Looks like he's heading to a 3:59 based on the 83 mile split, but he's been slowing down a bit. Gonna be really close. It's a perfect day here. 76 degrees and a bit humid. Couldn't be better at this race.

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Sylvan Smyth | http://www.sportstats.asia | sylvan@sportstats.asia | Starvas

interesting seeing matt russell where he is. the two matts are having good races.

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Dan Empfield
aka Slowman

To see him break four hours his first race out would be... unreal. I don't care if he walks the marathon. Hammer Starky! Hammer!

Going to be close!

Heard there was a terrible incident on the swim. Anyone heard anything. May have overlooked it in this thread.

4:01. Nice bike ride!

4:01

Bravo Starky

Weather looks perfect. Hansen may run something crazy fast.

My money is on a 2:35 for Matt. Takes the win and goes sub 8 - by a lot.

This is the first I've checked it does Hanson have a chance of winning

Anyone notice the wheels Diederen was using? Those new 2 spoke wheels!

He's in 4th behind Starky, morf guy and Butterfield

amazing athlete with a bit of bad luck :-/

go starky go!

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The entire event (IM) is like "death by 1000 cuts" and the best race is minimizing all those cuts and losing less blood than the other guy. - Dev

Starky is hanging in so far. Very impressive.

Yes, a man died near the end of his swim.

http://m.chron.com/news/article/Woodlands-man-dies-during-the-swimming-portion-of-11091508.php

Either the athlete tracker mile marks are off, or this is just insanity. It reports:

Mile 3.7 to 5.8, Hanson laid down a 5:54/mile split. (compared to Starky's 6:41/mile avg.)
Mile 5.8 to 7.8, Starky answered with a 5:51/mile split.

Starky 7:58 ahead of Butterfield and 8:22 ahead of Hanson at mile 8.8

I always just assume the tracker is screwed up. Hanson is in second at 10 miles and down by 7 mins. Starting to put big time into Starky. Probably just a matter of time. He's flying.

So no live coverage at ironman.com other than the fixed cameras?

Okay, the mile markers are off. They report Hanson doing a 5:08/mile split for the one where it reported Starky at 5:54.

Hanson is putting 30-40 seconds/mile into Starky. 8 minutes down with 18 miles to go.

The Sportstats tracker has been well ahead of the ironman.com one

Starky walking Hanson was right behind. Butterfield about 2min down

hung on for quite a while today! I was starting to think he maybe could hold on for podium, but that seems unlikley now

Someone please give me an update I have hardly any reception where I'm at can barely get on slowtwitch

TOP 10 Pro Men - Thru Run Split 11 - 19.16 mi
1 7:09:17 Matt Hanson
2 7:13:06 3:49 Tyler Butterfield
3 7:13:44 4:28 Ronnie Schildknecht
4 7:14:44 5:27 Kirill Kotsegarov
5 7:15:19 6:03 Will Clarke
6 7:17:22 8:05 Matthew Russell
7 7:18:17 9:00 Leon Griffin
8 7:19:11 9:54 David Plese
9 7:19:56 10:40 Callum Millward
10 7:20:16 10:59 Marc Duelsen

TOP 9 Pro Women - Thru Run Split 7 - 12.49 mi
1 7:17:22 Jodie Robertson
2 7:20:30 3:09 Lauren Brandon
3 7:20:39 3:18 Alicia Kaye
4 7:21:46 4:25 Maja Stage-Nielsen
5 7:24:10 6:49 Tine Deckers
6 7:25:58 8:37 Michaela Herlbauer
7 7:33:05 15:43 Caroline Livesey
8 7:36:36 19:14 Annett Finger
9 7:36:44 19:22 Leslie Miller