5150 Zurich Results 2011

Ritchi Nicholls and pre-race favorite Nicola Spirig top 5150 Zurich results 2011.

Many people picked Chris McCormack from Australia to win the 5150 race in Zurich, Switzerland. Considering that Chris is a two-time Ironman World Champion it's easy to see why people felt that way.

However there is a huge difference between a 5150 race and an Ironman Triathlon, and most likely Chris needs more distance in order to race at his best and wear the competition down.

THE RACE

Chris McCormack was in trouble right from the swim/bike transition as he ran into problems and lost valuable time.

It's sort of what I meant by the difference between a 5150 race and an Ironman. A mistake that takes a bit of extra time in an Ironman really does not amount to much, but a 5150 is basically a sprint and small mistakes can make a big difference.

As a result Chris had to really push in order to try and catch up to the leaders. It was a group that included all the other pre-race favorites.

Unfortunately Chris was given a 30-second penalty out on the bike course and that didn't help his cause either. Just the same he had an amazing run but was unable to catch the eventual race winner Ritchi Nicholls from Scotland.

Joshua Amberger from Australia managed to hold off Chris McCormack and took second spot.

As you can see from the final times, the mistake in transition and the time penalty proved costly to Chris.

TOP THREE PRO MEN 5150 ZURICH RESULTS 2011Ritchi Nicholls.............1:47:20Joshua Amberger.............1:48:04Chris McCormack.............1:48:33

The pro women?s race was never in doubt and Nicola Spirig of Switzerland was an easy winner in a time of 2:02:17.

ABOUT THE 5150

This series of races is the newest addition to the WTC family of triathlon events.

Possibly some visitors to this page are not familiar with the 5150. The name was derived from taking the distances of the 1.5k swim, 40k bike, and 10k run that total 51.5K and so the 5150 was the resulting name.

The distances are the distances of the Olympic Triathlon, but the biggest difference between this race and the one you will see in the Olympics is that there is no drafting allowed in the 5150 and there is in the Olympics.

Basically drafting in the Olympics has turned the race into a team event and if you are not with the lead bike group when the bike/run transition is reached it is very difficult to catch up in a race where seconds make a big difference.

Many pro triathletes really enjoy the 5150 format because of the no draft rule. It does not hurt that there is a lot of money at stake in this series of races. The pros that topped the 5150 Zurich results 2011 did pretty well for themselves.