Ironman: Eighth title confirms ownership

As Cameron Brown entered the finishing stages of the Ironman New Zealand yesterday, the race announcer was not talking in hyperbole when he said: "Cameron Brown owns this race."

He does. Has done since 2001 when he claimed the first of his now eight titles.

Not only did he win yesterday, but he broke his own course record by more than two minutes to finish in a time of eight hours, 18 minutes and five seconds, more than seven minutes ahead of Terenzo Bozzone in second.

Now Brown just wishes he could replicate that result in Kona in October, the Holy Grail of ironman events, where he has twice finished second.

He is a phenomenal athlete but there is one major entry missing from his CV and, at 36, time is running out.

That is why he will forgo his usual programme, which normally took in the European Championships in Germany, to put all of his eggs in the Kona basket.

"I have done three ironmans every year for 10 years," he said. "I need to [concentrate the rest of the year on Hawaii]. I'm running out of years. I'm 36. The good thing is I am still going faster and Mark Allen won it at 37, so there is still time."

Yesterday was not quite a Kona day, when everything has to go perfectly to beat the best the world's best ironman athletes, but it was close.

He was in the chasing bunch out of the swim - former Commonwealth Games swimmer Brent Foster was always going to emerge first - and was second off the bike at the end of the 180km cycle leg.

He then ran a marathon in 2hr 42m, his fastest, to reel in early leader Dirk Bockel of Luxembourg and power away to his eighth win.

"I am very happy to get a race record here and run the way I did. Everything is on track for Kona."

While yesterday's win was comfortable for Brown, the race gave a glimpse of ironman's future in this country with Bozzone's performance in his first ever ironman.

The world half ironman champion (70.3 miles) stepped up in distance for the first time and proved with more experience he has the ability to follow Brown and win it multiple times.

"He will win this race very, very soon," Brown said.

"When you retire," Bozzone quipped back.

Brown doesn't look like retiring anytime soon but Bozzone has age on his side.

At 24, he is a relative child but he also has a catalogue of results to point to his promise. He is a two-time world junior duathlon and two-time triathlon champion and only turned his back on conventional triathlons after his controversial non-selection for Beijing.

"Ironman is definitely where it's at in the sport of triathlon," Bozzone said. "I watched my first one in 2001. From that moment on knew that Kona was where I wanted to go.

"Cameron is a class act and he put on a world-class performance today. To be able to compete with that on my first ironman is nearly impossible, so I just went out there to do what I could and I'm pretty happy with that.

"It was great to be able to race with Cameron and to learn how he goes through the motions of putting a race together."

Not that his body felt like it was going through the motions.

"I can't think of any places that aren't sore," he said after hobbling to the winner's stage.

"It's brutal," added Bockel, who was also racing in his first ironman.

"When I got off the bike I thought, 'I have just ridden 180kms, how am I going to run a marathon?" Bozzone said. "There were a lot of tough patches but managed to get through them. It paid off and it's great to be able to come second to Cameron."

One person who wished he had been up there on the podium was Richard Ussher.

The three-time Coast to Coast champion and world's best adventure racer trained specifically for Ironman New Zealand for three months in the hope of proving adventure racers could compete with triathletes.

Ussher was fifth, two places better than last year, but was left behind on the swim and was left playing catchup. He said he won't be taking his place in Kona.

"I had a pretty disappointing swim," he said. "I don't really know what happened. I was swimming on the back of a group for the first half but the guy whose feet I was on dropped out the back. I looked up and one minute we were there and the next 50m behind.

"I'm not finished [with ironman]. I have worked a lot on swimming but maybe it's something I need to get right for a couple of years. I found it incredibly frustrating this year. I got a coach and worked on my technique but it seems to be one step forward and 10 steps back. You just can't afford to give those top guys an inch."

Cameron Brown certainly doesn't need it. Eight wins attest to that.