Andrew Starykowicz (USA) played to his strength and stormed to the front of the race early into the bike by upping the tempo significantly on the field. Luke McKenzie (AUS) and TJ Tollakson (USA) were up for the challenge and managed to keep the American reasonably close for much of the ride while the rest of the field fell well off the pace being set out ahead.
Once the men hit the run, McKenzie was in his element as the tenacious Aussie started immediately chewing into Starykowicz's advantage. Patience was McKenzie's strength as he managed to reduce his gap to two minutes after completing half of the marathon, after coming out of transition and onto the run nursing an eight-minute deficit. Forging his way into the lead between 14 and 15 miles of the run, McKenzie slowly pulled away from the field by laying down a solid sub-2:50 marathon to take the win by an 11-minute winning margin over Tollakson in the men's only race in Madison, while notching his ninth IRONMAN win (and the first on North American soil) of his career.
Top 10 Pro Men
1 McKenzie, Luke AUS 8:17:19
2 Tollakson, TJ USA 8:28:17
3 Mckeon, Pattrick USA 8:28:36
4 Starykowicz, Andrew USA 8:32:28
5 Schmid, Stefan DEU 8:34:22