Frederic Funk Triumphant at Challenge St. Pölten, Anne Haug Victorious after Electrifying Run
What a race at Challenge St. Pölten! Frederic Funk executed a massive attack right from the get-go to gain a lead that was insurmountable to anyone, while Anne Haug and Imogen Simmonds battled for victory right up to the last meters! In Austria’s historical baroque city of St. Pölten, Frederic Funk, was relentless in winning CHALLENGE ST. PÖLTEN with overpowering force. In the extremely exciting women’s race it took the last two hundred metres for Anne Haug to figure out how to surpass Imogen Simmonds to take the win.
These highly contested races had everything, passion, energy and heaps of pressure on a race course consisting of a 1 lap swim leg of 1,9km in two different lakes with 200 meters of running in between followed by 1 lap of 90km where the S33 motorway becomes a bike route for a section of 25km followed by a half marathon through the historical city centre of St. Pölten, to the finish line.
Mens Race
In the men’s race it was German Timo Hackenjos who had the clear water ahead as he steered back towards the first transition with Belgium’s Christophe de Keyser in second trying to close the gap followed by the streamlining group of Pablo Dapena Gonzalez, Michael Raelert, Jan Stratmann, Maurice Clavel and Frederic Funk.
Out of first transition an onto the bike, it was the impressive Funk who immediately attacked to the front to take the lead, clearly on a mission, as he stretched away. Behind Funk were still athletes with renown cycling abilities such as Magnus Ditlev, Raelert, Pieter Heemeryck,Stratmann, Dapena Gonzalez and Philipp Bahlke. The pace was brutal and many were digging deep in the hurt locker. Funk was applying top-end speed and placing stress on the other athletesVO2 and anaerobic systems. By 60 kilometres Funk had made the gap and powered down to make the gap some two minutes from his nearest challengers: Ditlev and Bahlke. Funk just keep pulling away and as he dismounted in the second transition, he had amassed a lead of over four minutes.
Funk continued to catapult his way forward in the half marathon and it soon became apparent that the following athletes were now just vying for podium place as the German put more daylight between him and the chasing pack. After 3:44:49hr, he crossed the line over eight minutes ahead of Jan Stratmann who claimed second spot, with Maurice Clavel, taking third place some 30 seconds later.
Womens Race
The women’s race all came down to a sprint finish. Coming down the finish chute it was a battle between Imogen Simmonds and Anne Haug but Simmonds didn’t have the sprint legs and fell off the pace in the last few metres.
It was Anna-Lena Best-Pohl who made the race hard from the start coming out of the water into first transition and out onto the bike. But the time difference from the following pack was slender and with accomplished bikers of Norden and Simmonds soon hauled her back and tried to increase their lead together. Further back were other favourites in the race including Maja Stage-Nielsen and Anne Haug, looking to catch up on the bike. As Simmonds and Norden hit the 25 kilometres mar that had amassed a 2.30 lead over the chasing riders including Anne Haug
At this stage Simmonds made her move and rode away from Nordén and the Swedish athlete had no answer on how to respond. However, Anna Haug the German World Champion had not given up the battle and was whittling away the lead time on Simmonds bridging the gap to around one and half minutes. Simmonds responded and powered down to take a lead of three minutes plus over Haug and she entered the second transition. To make matter worse for Haug she made a mistake in transition resulting in a one-minute time penalty.
But Haug is not World Champion for no reason, she has running ability and she quickly found her legs and effortlessly glided through the run course quickly winning back time and pulling Simmonds ever closer. The pair came together in the last few hundred metres of the race and it was Haug who had the sprint legs to pass Simmonds in the very last metres to cross the finish line in a time of 4:20:17hr with Simmonds only a marginal 13 seconds behind. A further four minutes behind to take 3rd spot was German Juliane Höfer.
The sprint finishes did not end there as nine minutes behind Haug, GB’s Laura Siddall and Denmark’s Maja Stage-Nielsen were sprinting to the finishing line side by side with the Dane just pipping Laura to the post for 4th place.
