London T100 results: Sam Laidlow hangs on to take impressive win in the capital
Sam Laidlow held off a speedy Kyle Smith in London to win his first T100 event in impressive fashion
Reigning Ironman World Champion Sam Laidlow (FRA) dug deep to beat an charging Kyle Smith (NZL) on the run to secure his first T100 win in London today.
The Frenchman set tongues wagging for the swim when he was the only athlete to start the race in a swimskin rather than a wetsuit.
But despite coming out of the water with a significant gap, Laidlow put in an impressive bike leg and hung tough at the front on the run to secure the win.
Here’s what happened…
What happened in the swim at T100 London?
Air temperatures of 24.2°C and water temperatures of 20.6°C welcomed athletes as they got T100 London underway today in the city’s Royal Victoria Docks.
That of course meant wetsuits were optional, but only Laidlow decided to go with a swimskin, reportedly so he didn’t have to deal with the restriction he sometimes feels around the shoulders.
As soon as they were in the water Smith took the lead for a brief while before Aaron Royle (AUS) took to the front, as we’ve become accustomed to seeing.
Within several hundred metres USA’s Sam Long was already falling back, with Laidlow and Leon Chevalier (FRA) also seeming to struggle.
Back at the front, Britain’s Alistair Brownlee, Germany’s Rico Bogen and Smith stuck within touching distance of Royle, which is where they stayed throughout.
At the end of the two-lap swim Royle emerged first, closely followed by Brownlee, Bogen, Smith and Denmark’s Daniel Baekkegard.
Uber cyclist Magnus Ditlev (DEN) was just 20secs down, super runner Jason West (USA) was 32secs down and swimskin swimmer Laidlow was 67secs down.
As expected, Long was last out of the swim, some 3mins and 37secs down.
What happened on the bike?
Bogen quickly took to the front as the eight-lap bike got underwear, but things didn’t exactly go his way, with both of his bottles bouncing out of the saddle-mounted cages as he went over a speed bump.
Behind him, 15secs covered Smith, Brownlee, Royle, Gregory Barnaby (ITA), Ben Kanute (USA) and Baekkegard after just 4.5km.
The field bunched up more and by the end of lap one the top 14 were separated by only 20secs, with Ditlev now the man on point.
By the midway point of that second lap Laidlow had joined that front pack, making up his deficit from the swim. Things weren’t going so well for Brownlee, though, who suffered a front puncture.
That dropped the Brit down to 16th, 128secs off the race’s new leader, Laidlow. Given his bike pedigree, it wasn’t a huge shock, but what was less expected was Long losing time to the leader at the rear, rather than closing the gap as we’ve seen him do in other T100 races this year.
With the top dozen athletes so close together, the issue of drafting started to come to the fore (there was no Race Ranger in use here, unlike some other T100 races).
T100 rules outline a 20m draft exclusion zone, but at various points throughout the racing, footage seemed to show multiple athletes within that distance, yet no penalties were forthcoming.
Frederic Funk (GER) took the lead for a short spell in the middle of the bike leg before Laidlow made his move, taking the front and pushing the pace to increasingly build a gap.
Behind him there was still a chase ‘pack’, with Funk, Bogen Baekkegard, Smith, Ditlev, Youri Keulen (NED), Max Neumann (AUS) and Barnaby separated by little more than 15secs.
By lap seven Brownlee had made up five places after his puncture, but by this point he was 4mins 25secs off the lead. Long, meanwhile, was almost 9mins back.
Laidlow arrived into T2 some 93secs ahead of the chasers, with Funk, Bogen, Smith, Ditlev and Keulen coming in in quick succession.
Brownlee was almost 5mins down by the time he rolled into transition, while Long came in some 10mins 24secs off the lead. Despite the deficit the American looked relaxed and happy, high-fiving fans and giving his wife a kiss as he left.
What happened on the run?
Smith came flying out of T2 and after 1.5km he’d already cut Laidlow’s lead by 20secs. Bogen was unable to stick with him and would later find out he’d been given a 30sec penalty for not putting his socks into his transition box after deciding not to wear them.
The gap between Laidlow and Smith continued to drop as the athletes approached halfway, with the Kiwi just 35secs behind by the mid point.
Behind him, Baekkegard and Funk moved into third and forth, while further back Brownlee and Pieter Heemeryck (BEL) were also moving well and making up a couple of places.
Being a six-lap run course, the leaders ended up lapping some of the athletes toward the back of the pack, with Long being one of them.
However, on lap five the American pushed the pace, moving past Laidlow and encouraging the Frenchman to stay on his hip. He obliged and for a brief spell the gap to Smith started going up again, but soon enough Long had moved off again and Laidlow stuck to his own pace.
By this point, with just 4km left of the 18km run leg, Heemeryck had moved away from Brownlee and passed Barnaby into seventh.
The gap between Laidlow and Smith dropped again on the final lap, but not quick enough, as the Frenchman took the tape in a time of 3:13:38.
Smith crossed the line some 24secs later to make it two second-place finishes in a row on the T100 series following his performance at T100 San Francisco last month.
Third went to Baekkegard, who finished a minute ahead of Ditlev.
Sam Laidlow said:
On what it means to win: “It means so much to be here with my family and friends that we’ve known for years. So to come here and do this… it’s insane. Especially because this year’s been really rough, right.
“If there’s a message I want to put across it’s that when you really hit rock bottom, you never know what tomorrow might bring. Yesterday in my head I thought I might come top 10, maybe, so to do this today is insane.”
On swimming without a wetsuit and making moves on the bike: “Two weeks ago I got a penalty in another race, so I was like, ‘I really don’t want to risk getting a penalty here’, so I rode to the front.
“I rode at the top end of what I thought I could do. I kept holding it and, I don’t know if it’s because I didn’t use a wetsuit, I didn’t overheat, but just had really good legs. I smashed my power PB, so yeah, pretty chuffed.”
Kyle Smith said:
“[I’m] obviously a little big disappointed. It’s kind of like some’s dangling a carrot in front of you and you can’t quite get it. But I’m happy with how I performed today. I’m really proud of how I dug deep and gave it my everything and at the end of the day that’s all I can do.
“If that’s only good enough for second then I’m happy with that. And obviously happy for Sam. Two weeks after an Ironman, to do that, that’s incredible.”
T100 London: Men’s final standings
- Sam Laidlow (FRA); 03:13:38
- Kyle Smith (NZL); 03:14:03
- Daniel Baekkegard (DEN); 03:16:41
- Magnus Ditlev (DEN); 03:17:41
- Frederic Funk (GER); 03:17:53
- Pieter Heemeryck (BEL); 03:19:09
- Rico Bogen (GER); 03:20:05
- Alistair Brownlee (GBR); 03:20:27
- Youri Keulen (NED); 03:20:43
- Gregory Barnaby (ITA); 03:21:05
Rob Slade
