De Gasperi returns to winning ways at Sierre Zinal
Marco wins at Sierre Zinal
After succumbing to the descending skills of Kilian Jornet at Giir di Mont a couple of weeks ago, Italy’s Marco De Gasperi turned the tables on the Catalan to win yesterday’s classic Sierre Zinal race…
ISF event release
There was a triumphant win for Marco De Gasperi in the fourth round of the Skyrunner® World Series on the fast Sierre-Zinal course on Sunday, shaving 32” off his best performance to cross the finish in 2h30’18” . Portugal’s Cesar Costa was second in 2h31’20” and Spain’s Kilian Jornet third in 2h34’15” and Luis Hernandez, fourth. He now moves up to lead the world ranking. Last year’s world champion Tofol Castañer, recovering from injury, took a satisfactory 7th.
Spain’s Oihana Kortazar shows just how it’s done closing in 3h11’24”. She now takes over the World Series ranking lead from Emanuela Brizio, absent due to illness. Second and third were French runners Aline Camboulive and Celine Lafaye respectively. Last year’s winner, American Megan Lund was fourth and rising star, Zhanna Vokueva from Russia, fifth.
Oihana Kortazar
Costa led the men’s race for the first 12 km, with De Gasperi and Jornet hot on his heels. De Gasperi closed in on Costa on the last stretch of the ascent, trailing him a tight ten seconds behind, while Jornet was at a safe three minute distance. There was no stopping De Gasperi who increased his advantage to finish comfortably more than two minutes ahead of Costa.
Kilian Jornet
The same strategy was adopted in the women’s race with France’s Aline Camboulive in the lead up to the 12 km mark followed by Megan Lund a minute behind. Oihana Kortazar, nearly three minutes from the leader, confidently moved in and overtook her rival, gaining almost six minutes advantage to close a good two minutes ahead of Camboulive.
In what was probably the highest number of top international runners to date, it made for an extremely competitive atmosphere over the 31km course and 2,200m vertical ascent. The race celebrated an all-time record turn-out in 38 years of activity with 3,315 participants from 20 countries.
The rich American field included long distance runners Nick Clark (36th), Max King (20th) and Glen Randall, who finished a very respectable 8th in 2h45’34”.
The Skyrunner® World Series moves on to the 4,299m summit of the Pikes Peak Ascent on August 20th in Colorado, with 21 km of high altitude uphill thrills. The Series that pits the world’s greatest mountain runners against each other, concludes with the grueling Sentiero delle Grigne on September 18th in Italy.
Skyrunner® World Series provisional ranking, see full ranking here.
M
Luis Hernandez – 350 points
Mikhail Mamleev – 284 points
Jabi Olabarria – 234 points
W
Oihana Kortazar -388 points
Emanuela Brizio – 316 points
Laia Andreu – 272 points
