Luke Bell today won the Shepparton 1/2 IM in a time of 3:45:45.
Shepparton’s a town of approx. 25,000 people about 2 hrs north of Melbourne. Its people are renowned for the great Aussie tradition of Rootin’, Disputin’ and Shootin’. Yep, she’s wild up there, maybe that’s why Bell went so quick, he just wanted to get the hell outta there. Check his times out below.
MEN SWIM BIKE RUN TOTAL
1 Luke Bell swim: 20:03 ride: 2:06:16 run: 1:16:45 Total: 3:45:45
Great effort from Bell but that swim just has to be short doesn’t it?
Even the Bike might be a bit suspect - that is approaching Jan Sibbersen (probably even better) and Bjorn Andersson type splits.
I did the Tauranga Half in NZ (2003) that Cameron Brown won in 3:52 (from memory) and clocked the bike course at 86km and change. The exact same speedo had the Taupo Ironman at 180.5k so I am sure that Tauranga was well short.
Bit strange that race organisers often get measurements so wrong. eg Roth and the famous case of the London Tri when I think Simon Lessing won with a run split that was either just over or just under Haille Gabresallasies (spelling??) 10 k world record.
Angus and Meade swam 54 and 56 at Forster so their swim times aren’t all that far out of line but 20mins seems Hackett like. Was the swim in the lake or in the Goulbourn River? They also went 4.49 and 51 on the bike at Forster so their bike splits at Shepp don’t look unrealistic. Shepp’s a pretty flat town so you’d expect fast bike times.
Looks like young Luke is a lad on a mission, maybe next year will be HIS year. He certainly has the scope to win at Kona one day.
The race directer is a surveyer - It is dead accurate. Luke got out of the water with a speedy John Van Wisse, rode in perfect conditions, and ran well (7min slower than fastest run split) to go on and win, with dog across the line!
Luke’s swim was actually 23.03 (not 20.03 as seen on xtri), which still adds up to a 3.45. I was there and the swim seemed the right distance,the bike measured 90.15 (on my clock) and the run is supposed to be very accurate. He was FLYING.
Smoking times…even if this course is accurate, it would be a bit quicker than some others. If I recall, Damien Angus was around 4:10 at Tupper Lake 2003.
This lends support to my contention that a 7:30 IM is possible. a .75h swim, 4.10h bike and 2.6h run will do it. I think we will see it in about 10 years. It will require the top pros to start racing a la Helreigle and Larsen, and then, also have to race the run.
In that same race Susan Peters won for the women, with a bike split 12 minutes faster than #2, coming into T2 with a 6 minute lead, which she maintained in the run. It is possible for more than a few to bike and run fast at the same time.
Well, i’m told that epo gives you an automatic 15% improvement (in what i’m not sure), so in the next 10-15 years, i’m sure some crazy good drugs/doping techniques will turn up. 7:30 will be very doable with the right genetic anomaly combined with the right doping methods.
What you are implying is that up until now no performances have been drug assisted, all of a sudden top pros will hit the juice and push each other under 7:30.
I don’t know where you got the 15% improvement but it will definitely not be in speed. If you work that out a 5 hr bike split becomes 4:15, a 3 hr run becomes a 2:33 and a 9 hr IM becomes 7:39.
Not even Nina Kraft improved that much in a season!
How accurate was the course(s) measured? With all due respect, our sport is notorious for in-accurately measured courses - typically short. This happens in races from the local volunteer neighbourhood kids tri right on up to the ITU World Championships and Ironman events.
It’s pretty hard to get absolutly ideal conditions for a long distance triathlon. There always seems to be something that comes up - waves, wind, heat etc . … However, once in a while you do get absolutly perfect conditions that yield some awesome times.
I doubt that 7:30 IM is possible. But then many other performances were believed to be records forever…which was proven totally wrong.
Anyway, the reason I’m doubting that 7:30 is ever possible is from an energy standpoint. How do you fuel your body to perform that long at such high intensities? The performance at Endurance events, as you sure know, depends on energy availability, mainly CHO substrates. It’s the inability to maintain adequate blood glucose levels that causes athletes to slow down and perform at a lower intensity. Although I do not have exact numbers on energy expenditure during an IM, this could easily be calculated through the measurements of oxygen consumption. In fact, it would make it an interesting study. Measure the oxygen consumption of today’s fastest IM swimmer during the swim, measure the rate of Andersson’s oxygen consumption during his IM bike intensity, and measure the O2 consumption of the fastest IM runners during the run. One could easily calculate the energy expenditure during those individual’s IM disciplines. Glycogen stores are limited, as is the rate of carbohydrate uptake/digestion. Do you think the rate of energy expenditure would be equal/greater than the sum of energy from the glycogen stores and carbohydrate absorption during the 7.5hrs? Take into account that the athlete will most likely not consume any CHO during the first 45min…This would mean that the athlete can only absorb around 2025 to 2700Cal during the event (300-400Cal/hr x 6.75hrs). Would make it an interesting study. Even if it is possible, we measured 3 different athletes. I’m sure we all agree that the best swimmer is more economical in the water than the others. Same for the bike and run.
I believe that 7.5hrs IM is possible if the doped athletes receives intravenous glucose during the bike and therefore starts the marathon with plenty of glycogen stores left.
I think a new energy drink/food needs to be invented. Maybe even something that injects glucose straight into the body like you said. Sort of like a diabetic measurement thing, but one that injects not draws.
Also the course needs to be superfast. Maybe a double distance of the race Luke Bell went 3:45 at…
In relation to course measurement, this is the same course they use at Shep every year. I can understand that the swim might be out by a bit but the bike a run haven’t changed from previous years, so they still should be comparible. The weather as good for riding and running as can be seen from McKenzie’s run split of 1.10 and overall time of 3.53. This was apparently his first half, coming from sprint distance triathlon/duathlon. The dude can run.
It’s not the drink/food, it’s your body’s ability to absorb the nutrients. why allow intravenous supplementation? It’s illegal, it’s doping and doesn’t help the sport. I only mentioned intravenous CHO supplementation because this is the only way I see a 7.5hrs IM possible.