Perfect weather for 1600 participants Bonn is crazy about triathlons
Bonn · After a 3.8 kilometre swim, 60 kilometre bike ride through the Siebengebirge and a 15 kilometre run along the banks of the Rhine, Verena Walter and Horst Reichel emerged as victors in the Bonn Triathlon. 1600 people took part.
The professional triathlete Horst Reichel decided to sign up for the Bonn triathlon on relatively short notice because it seemed to the 35-year-old long distance specialist to be the best preparatory event for the Ironman event in Frankfurt on 9 July.
Arriving from Darmstadt on Saturday evening, Reichel won the 27th SWB Energie und Wasser Triathlon on Sunday in a time of 2:45:43. “I was looking for a difficult test run for my home triathlon in Frankfurt. I had already heard a lot of good things about Bonn. I therefore decided at short notice. And people were right. I have rarely experienced such a good atmosphere along the course. Bonners really are crazy about triathlons,” said the winner of Ironman Sweden 2014, who was part of the team Sport for Good.
Unlike in 2016, when the Bonn Triathlon, with its unique selling point of a swim in the Rhine, had to be converted to a duathlon because of high water levels, all those involved could count to three again. Reichel was 1:17 minutes faster than the second place Simon Schwarz over the 3.8 kilometre swim, 60 kilometre bike ride through the Siebengebirge and a 15 kilometre run along the Beuel banks of the Rhine in glorious weather.
Verena Walter repeated last year’s win. The 36-year-old from Iserlohn needed 3:12:12 to complete the three disciplines. In 2016 she took part in the Ironman on Hawaii for the first time as a professional triathlete and was the third best German female coming 27th. In Bonn, the competition took everything out of her. “Did you have to run so fast?” she asked second place Sandra Wassink-Hitzert from the Netherlands, who reached the finish 34 seconds behind Walter.
Among the more than 1000 individual starters and 600 team participants, one athlete particularly interested the many spectators along the route: Olympic champion canoeist Max Rendschmidt, who completed his first triathlon to the applause of his somewhat faster younger brother Kai. “Really hard,” said the exhausted Olympic champion. He had not specifically trained for his triathlon debut because of the start of the World Cup.
Head organiser Joachim Sommershof summed up: “It was a great event today, finally with all three disciplines again and would not have been possible without the approximately 300 helpers.” (Orig. text: Thomas Heinen)
