June 20, 2006

Cameron Brown third at Half Ironman of Zarautz

The Zarautz International Half Ironman turned out to be one tough race. Brown had a good start but by the middle of the 2.5km swim, the athlete in front of him had lost the toes of the front group and by the time Brown came around the group had made their decisive break. He finished the swim about 1 minute 30 seconds behind the leader and in about 6th position.

Once on the bike the easy part of the race was over, as the 84km bike was one of or probably the toughest bike leg ever. The first part included 2x30km loops each with a 4km climb and then up and down for the rest. Gradients of 20% were placed at the 65km mark and with a climb of 5km Brown’s 1 minute lead on Llannos and Pontano evaporated in only a few km’s.

After the fastest bike split by only one second, Cameron exited the transition in 4th place, 1:50 min behind the leading 3 athletes. Cameron managed to close the gap slightly on the leaders and picked up Saiz with 5km to go and finished third.

Zarautz Internation Half Ironman, Zarautz, Spain.
2.5km Swim, 84km bike, 20km run

1st Eneko Llanos (3:59:46) Spain
2nd Francisco Pontano (3:59:50) Portugal
3rd Cameron Brown (4:02:27) NZ