From the Article: "What Makes Chrissie Wellington So Good?"
Flash back to the summer of 2008—the 2007 Ford Ironman World Champion, Chris McCormack, is having a knock-down, drag-out, one-on-one battle with Eneko Llanos of Spain in Frankfurt, Germany, at Ironman Europe. During the week leading into the race, McCormack and Wellington had become friends. “We spent some time talking and she’s such a positive person,” remembers McCormack. The run course in Frankfurt loops around and at one point the men ran past the lead women. “When I ran by Chrissie,” McCormack continues, “she started running with me and cheering ‘Way to go Chris, you are running GREAT! Who’s in second?’ I could barely breathe and I yelled back, ‘Llanos… he’s right behind me.’ So now she’s cheering for both of us and continuing to stay with both Eneko and me. Everyone knew Chrissie was a special talent, but after she ran with us for the better part of the next mile, I realized just how special.”
How special? She won the first Ironman she attempted—Ironman Korea in 2007—and she has yet to lose any Ironman-distance event. That’s three times in a row in Kona, two times in Australia and two times in Germany. In Kona this past October, she broke Paula Newby-Fraser’s 17-year-old course record and went 8:54:02. At the Quelle Challenge in Roth, Germany, she took nearly 14 minutes off the existing course record and went 8:31:59, the fastest time ever for a woman at an Ironman-distance race.
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