Norway's Solveig Lovseth rallies for 1st Ironman World Championship title

Norway's Solveig Lovseth made the most of her first Ironman World Championship race, rallying from behind to win her first world title in Saturday's race in Kona, Hawaii.

Lovseth, 26, finished with a time of 8:28:27, coming from behind to beat Kat Matthews from the United Kingdom by 35 seconds. Matthews finished second with a time of 8:29:02 and Germany's Laura Philipp was third at 8:37:28.

Lovseth, who has been competing in Ironman events for less than two years and was in just her third race at the full 140.6-mile distance, won her second straight full-distance Ironman after winning the Athletic Brewing Ironman Lake Placid event on July 20 with a time of 8:43:29.

On a sweltering day where temperatures approached 90 degrees, Lovseth was in 14th place after the 2.4-mile swim. She made up that ground by posting the second-fastest split on the 112-mile bicycle segment (4:31:53) to enter the 26.2-mile marathon run in third place.

Lovseth entered the marathon run 5:44 behind, but benefitted from both competitors ahead of her who had been battling for first place being forced to withdraw in the final 10 miles.

England's Lucy Charles-Barclay, the 2023 world champion, led into the marathon portion, but was forced to withdraw from the race due to requiring medical attention around the 17-mile mark.

With approximately two miles left, American Taylor Knibb stopped due to exhaustion, allowing Lovseth to pass her and move into first.

She held on from there to cap off an impressive run for Norwegian Ironman competitors. Norway swept the podium of the men's Ironman World Championship last month in Nice, France, with Casper Stornes taking first, Gustav Iden second and Kristian Blummenfelt third.

Lovseth finished 48th in the Triathlon and 11th in the mixed-relay Triathlon at the 2024 Paris Summer Olympics.

--Field Level Media