Originally published at: IRONMAN World Championship 2025: Salvisberg Leads Out of Water, Laidlow Struggles - Slowtwitch News
Andrea Salvisberg led out of the water in Nice. Photo: Eric Wynn
The 2025 IRONMAN World Championship is underway in Nice, France, and the pro men are off to a quick start. They dove into the Mediterranean Sea just after 7 a.m. local time on Sunday, and for the first half of the swim, things were relatively close.
The swim course in Nice is the shape of an M, with athletes setting out into the water, turning around back to the beach and then repeating another journey out and back. At the midpoint of the M, there was a large group of men racing in single file as they rounded the buoys and set off to complete the next 1.2 miles. By the time the first swimmers were approaching the beach, things had spread out a bit more, with several distinct groups.
Kristian Blummenfelt was a minute back of the lead after the swim. Photo: Eric Wynn
It was Switzerland’s Andrea Salvisberg who was first out of the water, posting a swim split of 45:11. A former World Triathlon athlete and Olympian, Salvisberg is often one of the top men heading into T1. Salvisberg’s lead was slim, with Germany’s Jonas Schomburg (an athlete who Kristian Blummenfelt named as a dark horse in Nice at Friday’s press conference) just a second back, South African Jamie Riddle four behind, and nine other men within 13 seconds of the lead.
The first chase group was close to a minute back by the time they reached the swim exit. There were multiple big names in this group, including Rudy von Berg, Blummenfelt, Matthew Marquardt and Magnus Ditlev.
The next group was two minutes back, and that was where the past three IRONMAN world champions — Patrick Lange, Sam Laidlow and Gustav Iden — found themselves. Cam Wurf, Matt Hanson and Sam Long all climbed out of the water in the last big group, facing a gap of more than six minutes between themselves and the leaders.
2023 world champ Sam Laidlow had a slow swim by his standards, exiting the water two minutes back of first place. Photo: Eric Wynn
Laidlow’s slow start is quite unusual for him. He is often part of the lead group in IRONMAN races, including in 2023 in Nice, when he was just four seconds back of the lead. He was slow to get through transition, and he looked to be stretching out his back. Whatever issues were bothering him seemed to have been sorted by the time he was on his bike, as he climbed to sixth after 40 miles, sitting just one minute behind the leaders.
Be sure to follow along throughout the day, as Slowtwitch is on the ground in Nice and will be reporting updates all race long.