Michael Raelert starts his comeback at the Ironman 70.3 Miami this Sunday. "Finally, I can go for an attack again," says the Rostockian, who returns to competition after a long break. "I am delighted," says the 35-year-old, who fell ill with the Epstein-Barr virus in spring and had to stop with his training for a long time. "It is great that I can benefit from my full strength again."
Michael Raelert hopes that he will be able to achieve a similarly good performance at the Ironman 70.3 Miami as in the past two years. "This is a high goal for myself," he says after two victories in a row at the middle-distance race in Florida, "but I feel ready for a competition on a high level. The last weeks of training were really good, and now I want to know what that means in a race."
The competition of 1.9 kilometers of swimming, 90 kilometers of cycling and 21.1 kilometers of running has been characterized in recent years by very fast splits in all disciplines. "It is a race course on which you must be awake from the beginning and ready to go full throttle," says Michael Raelert. In the past two years he has done well in all three disciplines here, but the signs are different before the race on Sunday. "After the long break, of course, I do not know where I stand," says Michael Raelert, "I will try to follow up to the past two years."
A fast race should be guaranteed on the flat course in Miami, and the start list promises high speed from the beginning. "There are fast guys in the race," says Michael Raelert, "I think this competition will be really fast." Among others, the New Zealander Terenzo Bozzone belongs to the pro field, he ranked 4th at the Ironman 70.3 World Championship in September. And there are many other good athletes like Switzerland's long-term world-class Olympic-distance specialist Sven Riederer, the fast Russian Ivan Tutukin, Santiago Ascenco and Fabio Carvalho from Brazil, Franz Löschke and Horst Reichel from Germany, Guy Crawford (New Zealand) or the American American Matt Hanson. "Speed will be there," says Michael Raelert, "I hope from my side, too."