<\/p>
Ruth Astle<\/a> might only have improved by two places from her 14th position at last year\u2019s Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, but the Leeds-based triathlete could look at the positives with a sub-9hr performance, her fastest marathon on the Big Island and a $6,000 cheque for finishing in the prize money.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p> \u201cI thought if I had the best possible day I could maybe fight for the top five, but everything had to go right,\u201d Astle said. <\/p> \u201cI would have to get in the right group, work hard on the bike and have freakishly good run legs. Top 10 would have been pretty cool after this year, but I knew after missing the swim group that it would be tough with this field.\u201d<\/p> Facing one of the finest women\u2019s fields ever assembled for an Ironman race, Astle\u2019s chances hadn\u2019t been helped by a continuously recurring calf issue that made for her most frustrating season since turning pro after winning the overall age-group title in Kona in 2019. <\/p> It had led to a curtailed race calendar with only a seventh and fifth places at two low-key middle distance races to show for 2023.<\/p> \u201cAfter this year I was just delighted to finish,\u201d Astle said, who qualified for the race by winning Ironman Israel last November. <\/p> \u201cI was a bit disappointed with the swim. I thought after the practice swim I might come out with Anne [Haug] and Laura [Philipp] which would have put me in a better place.<\/p> Instead, Astle exited the water in 29th place but then started making inroads into the field on the 112-mile bike leg. \u201cI felt really good on the bike until 160km, then the wheels fell off in a fairly big way,\u201d she explained. <\/p> \u201cBut I kept moving forward and on the run I felt really good until 33km and then started cramping. I had to walk and chill out a bit until I could get moving.\u201d<\/p> Astle also had a word for new Ironman world champion Lucy Charles-Barclay<\/strong><\/a>, whose gun-to-tape victory set a new course record<\/a><\/strong>. <\/p> \u201cIt was insane. We\u2019ve seen glimpses of it before in the Ironman 70.3 World Championship she won [in 2021] when she was so much better than everyone else across everything,\u201d Astle said.\u00a0<\/p> \u201cShe\u2019s obviously had a challenging couple of years so to see her come back and put together a performance like that here where she\u2019s had four second places is unbelievable and really cool to see.\u201d<\/p> While it was not the first women-only Ironman World Championship race (there was a double race-day here last year with the women on Thursday and men on Saturday), it was the first time that the women had the stage completely to themselves.\u00a0<\/p> \u201cIt felt really friendly on the course with lots of shouts from age-groupers,\u201d she added. \u201cI think you get similar from the men as well, but there is something different and special about a women-only day.\u201d By Tim Heming Published: Sunday, 15 October 2023 at 06:18 AM Ruth Astle might only have improved by two places from her 14th position at last year\u2019s Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, but the Leeds-based triathlete could look at the positives with a sub-9hr performance, her fastest marathon on the Big Island and a $6,000 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":26026,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"3"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance.jpg",1024,683,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance.jpg",800,534,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance.jpg",1024,683,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2023\/10\/ruth-astle-finishes-second-brit-in-resurgent-hawaii-performance.jpg",1024,683,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Tim Heming Published: Sunday, 15 October 2023 at 06:18 AM Ruth Astle might only have improved by two places from her 14th position at last year\u2019s Ironman World Championship in Hawaii, but the Leeds-based triathlete could look at the positives with a sub-9hr performance, her fastest marathon on the Big Island and a $6,000…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/26025"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/26026"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26025"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26025"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Ruth Astle on her Kona performance\u2026<\/strong><\/h2>
Ruth Astle on her injury woes pre-Kona<\/strong><\/h2>
Ruth Astle on Lucy Charles-Barclay’s performance\u2026<\/strong><\/h2>
Ruth Astle on the first women’s-only <\/strong>Kona\u2026<\/h2>
","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"