Originally published at: Ups and Downs from a Record Re-Writing Day in Texas - Slowtwitch News
We’re now through the first full month of the 2025 IRONMAN season, and apparently the theme for the year is Burn the Books. As in, burn the record books, because we’re going to be re-writing them all. Kristian Blummenfelt and Kat Matthews did their part on the way to victory, as did Taylor Knibb and Cam Wurf out on the bike courses. As it turns out, when you turn the wind off, Texas can be quite a fast day at the office, despite the incredible heat and humidity.
As is custom following a Pro Series event, here’s who we think had good and not so great days.
Up: Your Race Winners (and Their Respective World Title Chances)
If there were ever race performances that seemed to be statements of intent for the year, Blummenfelt and Matthews delivered them in spades here in Texas. Let’s start with Matthews, who set a world-best IRONMAN time in her victory. Matthews has been open in her quest for her first IRONMAN world title and with it, needing to make strides on her bike in order to stay closer to Knibb and then close it out with her top-tier run. To that end, Matthews rode 4:20:17 — nearly matching Knibb’s 4:19:46 — before obliterating the run, taking all of Knibb’s six minute lead away on the first of three run laps. It also appears that Matthews left some time on the table, mentioning post-race that she’d slowed in the latter half of the marathon to save herself for IRONMAN Hamburg on June 1st.
As for Blummenfelt, his race performance showed a disciplined approach and trust in his run (typically that would be how we’d be describing Matthews). With a large pack of men out front, Blummenfelt showed restraint, riding with Wurf, Robert Kallin, Nick Thompson, Kristian Høgenhaug, and Antonio Benitez Lopez in the late stages of the bike and not trying to shake up the group. But once on the run, Blummenfelt rocketed away from the field, hitting the front by the two mile mark and shedding his last chaser (Benitez Lopez) by the sixth mile. He ran an absurd 2:34:03 to win in 7:24:20, on a course that is pretty much bang-on the full 140.6 miles.
Both showed that they’ve shored up weaknesses; Matthews her bike, and Blummenfelt his tolerance for heat and humidity. That’s scary news for anyone looking to challenge them for the IRONMAN world titles later this year, assuming that they can keep up the fitness (and, as always, a dash of luck never hurts).
Down: Taylor Knibb
It’s probably not fair to Knibb to put her here after a second-place performance in what is just her second IRONMAN. She also secured her entry into the IRONMAN World Championships later this year. Mission accomplished, then. But Knibb is such a dominant force at T100 / 70.3 distance racing these days that it is almost expected of her to win every single time she toes a starting line. It was the prevailing theme in our reader forum leading up to the event, with an expectation that her bike prowess would decimate the entirety of the field.
As it turns out, it was not Knibb’s bike but her swim that was most of her margin, swimming only behind Rachel Zilinskas and more than six minutes better than Matthews, Lisa Perterer, and Alice Alberts. And the day almost came to an early end at the conclusion of the bike, as Knibb crashed while dismounting her bike. It was a clumsy error, and one that could have derailed her from running at all.
Instead, Knibb appeared to be unscathed. But once again, on the run and Knibb was in the port-o-john. It’s become a common theme at races above Olympic distance for Knibb, and it’s starting to cost her. By mile 4 it was really a question of when, not if, Matthews would make the pass for the lead. On the positive side, Knibb easily maintained her gap over third place Perterer; her second place was never really in doubt. It is her best finish in an IRONMAN to date. But if Knibb is going to be the type of all-dominant athlete that Chrissie Wellington and Daniela Ryf were before her, there’s still a lot of work to be done at this distance.
Up: Antonio Benito Lopez and Rudy Von Berg
At any other race — heck, any other edition of IRONMAN Texas — and we’d have been setting ourselves up for a good batch of popcorn to see whether RVB could pull another rabbit out of his hat and close out a second IRONMAN Texas title. Benito Lopez, meanwhile, showed that he can ride with the sport’s elite cyclists in a big race, and then still back it up with a pretty darn fast run.
I mean, let’s put this in world title context: they both had front pack swims and bikes. It just so happened that Blummenfelt unleashed a run that, outside of Patrick Lange, just doesn’t happen. These two are going to be competitive in both the Pro Series and the World Championship by the end of the year. As it stands, Von Berg moved into the Points lead with his third place result here.
Down: Kanute, Marquardt, Foley
This trio of American men simply did not have the Texas that any of them were looking for. Ben Kanute admitted his disappointment in his 17th place finish over on Instagram. This despite having the day’s fastest swim (of finishers) and being within four minutes of the pace set by the front group. It was just another struggle bus run for Kanute, a far cry from his sub 2:40 effort at Challenge Roth two years ago that saw him on the podium.
For Matthew Marquardt and Trevor Foley, cramps were their undoing. Marquardt suffered from the same debilitating quad lockup that ruined his IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship race and with it, his bid to become the inaugural IRONMAN Pro Series champion. Marquardt managed to soft pedal his way through the first few hours of the bike before being able to show some of his potential, coming home 15th with a 2:47 run. Foley, too, suffered from foot cramps while swimming, then all in his legs during the ride before deciding to pull the plug and fight another day.
Up: Tamara Jewett
Jewett was making her full-distance debut in Texas. On paper, this isn’t a course that would suit her; she’s hurt more at non-wetsuit swims, and the resulting impact on the bike probably wouldn’t allow Jewett to use her astonishing run ability. In many ways she’s a modern Mirinda Carfrae.
As expected, Jewett was indeed well back coming out of the water in Texas, more than 10 minutes back of the leading Zilinskas and Knibb. Her ride, a 4:45 effort, was just about the median effort of all women pros (including DNFs). It left her outside of the top 10 starting the run with 10 minutes to make up in order to earn a paycheck. Yet that’s apparently not an issue for Jewett. She was the only pro woman other than Matthews to run under three hours, and six minutes faster than Lisa Perterer on the run. At the end she nearly bridged to Sara Svensk for fifth, and picked up a worlds slot. That’s a great debut day.