It seems like it was just yesterday, but I’m going back 15 years. In 1992 at the ITU World Championships in Muskoka Ontario Canada, Simon Lessing won his first ITU World’s. The same day, a young guy named Spencer Smith won the Junior ITU World Championships. Incidentally, on the women’s side, Michellie Jones won here first World Championship…and 15 years later he is going pretty strong as reigning Kona World Champ.
By 1993, Spencer Smith had graduated to racing senior and the World Championships were in Manchester England. Simon was the reigning world Champion. But, aparently that did not intimidate Spencer. He just raced from the front on the bike and distanced himself from all the chasers including Lessing, building an insurmountable buffer that no one could close on. The results that day from Manchester went like this (for those that remember, there was an awesome Jones vs Smyers sprint finish):
Elite Men 1 Smith, Spencer GBR 01:51:20 2 Lessing, Simon GBR 01:53:02 3 Carter, Hamish NZL 01:53:28 Elite Women 1 Jones, Michellie AUS 02:07:41 2 Smyers, Karen USA 02:07:43 3 Ritchie, Joanne CAN 02:08:46
Anyway, fast forward 14 years from Manchester and Smith and Lessing were fighting it out again at the Timberman 70.3. Pretty cool that after all these years and many ups and downs these warriors are still at it! Hopefully we will see Mr. Lessing doing some serious damage to the pro field in Kona. And Lessing showed again that closing 1:15 half marathon speed:
Place Bib# Spec Name Age G City St Rank Swim Pace Tran1 Rank Bike Rate Tran2 Rank Run Pace Penalty Final Div/Tot Div Gen/Tot G
===== ===== ==== ====================== === = ======== == ==== ======= ===== ======= ==== ======= ==== ======= ==== ======= ===== ======= ======= ======== ======= ======== =
1 4 70.3 Simon Lessing 36 M BOULDER CO 1 24:38 20:32 1:23 2 2:17:17 24.5 1:21 1 1:15:25 5:46 4:00:02 1/18 MPRO 1/1017 M
2 1 70.3 Bjorn Andersson 28 M BROOKLYN NY 2 25:17 21:05 1:18 1 2:09:12 26.0 1:06 26 1:26:00 6:34 4:02:52 2/18 MPRO 2/1017 M
3 3 70.3 Michael Lovato 33 M BOULDER CO 9 26:31 22:06 1:24 3 2:18:15 24.3 1:10 5 1:18:41 6:01 4:05:59 3/18 MPRO 3/1017 M
4 30 70.3 Mike Caiazzo 31 M SCARBORO ME 53 29:19 24:26 1:34 5 2:19:35 24.1 1:14 2 1:16:06 5:49 4:07:46 4/18 MPRO 4/1017 M
5 8 70.3 Spencer Smith 34 M PALM HAR FL 5 25:23 21:09 1:15 7 2:20:37 23.9 1:11 9 1:21:29 6:14 4:09:54 5/18 MPRO 5/1017 M
Jeez - 1:15 1/2 IM run. That is absolutely smoking! Would love to see Simon and Macca chasing down a scared Normann down the Queen K … OK, lets put the Sergio in there amongst the runners as well if he can just keep them somewhat close on the bike!
I wonder if we’ll ever see Spencer back in Kona. He’s had some bad luck there, but his 2000 IMFla win was vintage Spencer…just like he won in Manchester or Wellington ITU World’s. He’s actually still a pretty young guy although he has seemingly been around forwever. I realize that he “retired”, but there are lot of guys who unretire when they get the competition bug!
The pro talk on Fri was very entertaining with Simon talking about he and Spencer’s “hate / hate relationship”…
Spencer commenting on use of new equipment in a race (playing off of Lovato’s talk on what not to do on race day) “…what with the pink bike, I thought the new wheels would go down a treat”… - with the accent and choice of words it struck me as quite funny, probably one of those had to be there things -
It was a treat indeed to see those two in the same race in 2007.
Still trying to work off that 3rd apres-race Pepsi I had… and 5.5hrs of driving.
Anyway, when I saw Bjorn’s typical massive lead on the bike, it looked like a repeat of last years tour de force, but I didn’t realize who was in 2nd. Wow, what a run!!! That was amazing.
Got a pretty good front row seat (so to speak) on the ladies frontrunners out on the run course, as they typically were going one way while I was going the other, so I could see how that battle was shaping up.
Props to Des for pulling away on the 2nd lap of the run to nail down the win.
Simon was hysterical at the awards ceremony. Said something to the effect of “it was demoralizing how much of a lead Bjorn put into us (he and Lovato) on the bike, but we all know that Bjorn can’t run…” and then looked over at Bjorn and cracked a smile.
Apparently Spencer Smith went ass over teakettle at one point (and somebody else had a head-on collision with a traffic cop), and Simon had a pretty funny comment or 2 about that, but I forget exactly what he said.
(edited to add: funny comment about Spencer, not the other accident)
PS - Dev - Karen Smyers was there today too. She’s a fixture at Timberman, and it’s always very cool to see her out there kicking ass on course. And kicking 'em back afterwards.
PPS - Got to see Team Hoyt finish - very inspirational. Too bad the pics I took didn’t come out, or I’d attempt to post 'em. (not that having crappy pics seems to stop folks from posting anyway
I’ll bore you all w/ details about me ME **ME **and my day some other time. Bed is calling… must answer.
Mey ML…just saw the results…congrats on a podium placing with Mega SuperStar Erik Grimm in M40-44. If that guy raced the CEO challenge, he’d clean up every race. Erik is good at every sport he does. He just trains for a couple of weeks and then gets on podiums (kinda like you but faster). Amazing XC ski racer too.
I hope that Spencer shows up at Clearwater. I’m just pumped seeing Simon and Spencer back in action on the same turf. I’ve been fans of both of these guys since I was “kid” (and so were they). Probably the hilite of my year was when Simon Lessing, lurking on ST hearing that I will be in Longmont Colorado for business near Boulder fires me an email to join him for dinner. Then he sets everything up so that a poser age grouper can get some bogus training in, offering up access to the club that he swims at and inviting me to use his treadmill! Let’s face it…these guys might be bullet fast, but they are just regular age groupers in many ways…just a lot faster.
For those who did not read this piece I did on Simon’s toe to toe hammerfest with Mark Allen at Nice in th early 90’s read on:
That Erik Grimm dude is just silly-fast. He was in a whole other race than the rest of our AG.
(he actually got a special award for the fastest overall Masters time, so that technically took him outta our AG. Another fast 40-44 dude raced Elite. So, that being said, I ended up missing out on the watered-down poser AG win by… :12 freaking seconds. D’OH!!! :-p )
Simon definitely seems like a very cool dude. I can understand your man-crush on him.
Too much blood in my coffee-stream, gotta java!
-M
Check out this pix of Spencer yesterday. Holy pink ensemble batman!
Awesome race yesterday ( per usual of Endorfuns and Keith Jordan) coupled with great weather and a stellar field. I got a front row seat watching Simon cross the finish line as I was heading out for the run. He was very gracious and funny at the awards ceremony. Says he’ll be back next year.
Both Simon and Spencer looked strong on the run, especially Simon with that long fluid stride of his. I had a great spot at the penalty tent right after the dismount line so I got to see the pros transitions up close. Unbelievable how quick and efficient they are in T2.
Yep, Spencer did get a spot for Clearwater and he is racing there too. On the bike…there was a police officer that walked out on the course and someone in front of Spencer (perhaps a volunteer?) collided with the police officer and then Spencer was SOL and went into a ravine and head over his handle bars - then, he got up, brushed off and started riding…brakes all screwed up - got off again - fixed brakes and then was OK. Great race for everyone at Timberman! Dev, I wasn’t there, but talked to Spencer last night via phone. Glad to see Spencer and Lessing racing head to head again though!!
Cool for Spencer, will look forward to reading his side of the story on the Planet-X/S2 site at some point.
Hopefully a few more months of training and he’ll get his run down to the mid teens so that he can be in the mix for Clearwater.
Are Smith and Lessing a bit more chilled with each other nowadays?
SteveMc
ML: Sorry I missed you yesterday out in the M40-44 crowd. I was looking forward to aging up next year until I looked at the times for M45-49. Don’t these guys ever slow down?
It was one of the highlights of my day seeing Spencer go past on his pink bike, as I didn’t know that he was racing. If he hadn’t crashed, I wonder if he might have challenged Lovato for the #3 slot? When I saw the gap behind Bjorn on the bike I thought it would be a repeat of next year, but I didn’t count on Simon pulling off a 1:15 on the run.
It’s always great to see Karen Smyers out on the course. I see her training around here as she lives nearby. She also coaches Dede Greisbauer (sp?) who placed 3rd yesterday, and watching the two of them churn up the water at Walden Pond is very impressive. Dede actually throws a wake.
Not sure…when I asked him who won Timberman he said Lessing - with a 1"15 run. He has never said anything at all negative about Lessing to me…but, they go WAY back and I am sure there is a love, hate, love, hate…relationship there. Clearwater will be great w/ all the super athletes there!
Wow, Spencer looks totally lean…he actually lacks cosmetic bulk (had to throw in the terminology) and looks like a pro triathlete, rather than a decathlete of a 100m sprinter! Glad to see he came out of the crash relatively unscathed and will be in Clearwater.
By the way, did you guys see some of the studly times put down at 70.3 Wiesbaden Germany? Stephane Bignet from France (aparently 2000 Sydney Olympian) put 14 minutes into the likes of Timo Bracht who was top 15 in Kona and recently won Ironman Frankfurt.
As for Kona, Simon will actually be going into this Kona rested with zero Ironmans under his belt during the season, exactly like his first win in Lake Placid. If I was the other pro men, I’d be worrying a bit…hopefully Spencer will get a Kona spot at Clearwater and be there for 2008.
They both left the transition area together yesterday after the race, chatting with each other as they walked with their bikes and gear.
Good, 'cos they both like taking the piss… and if any sport needs humour then triathlon definitely does…
SteveMc
That is wrong (on Ironman live) people were reading his ergomo head after the run and the race and like the telephone game, the numbers kept going up and up.
