Portuguese Filipe Azevedo and fellow IRONMAN 70.3 champion Tuan Chun Chang of Taiwan beef up the men’s pro cast in the Alveo IRONMAN 70. 3 Davao, both seeking to bring their winning act to the premier endurance race unfolding March 26 at Azuela Cove.
The event, which will mark the IM 70.3 Philippines’ return to the king city of the south after a three-year hiatus due to pandemic, has drawn 1,019 athletes from 48 nations one full month before it is fired off, underscoring the sport’s popularity both in the local triathlon scene and abroad.
Hong Kong has accounted for the biggest number of foreign entries thus far with 44 while England and Singapore are fielding in 28 and 26 athletes, respectively, followed by the US (23), Japan (22), India (14) and France (13).
Australia, whose world-class bets have dominated the local IM 70.3 and full IM races for years, is putting up an 18-athlete contingent, led by top women’s pro contender Dimity-Lee Duke, a multi-5150 race winner who placed third in the first IM 70.3 Davao in 2018 and wound up fourth in the following year.
Registration is ongoing. For details, log on to ironman.com/im703-davao-philippines-athletes.
Up for grabs are $30,000 purse for winners in both the men’s and women’s pro divisions of the event powered by Petron and sponsored by Active, Fulgaz, Hyperice ROKA, Vinfast, Breitling, Gatorade, Qatar Airways, Santini and Wahoo.
Portugal has only one entry but Azevedo isn’t after the quantity but the quality of performance he hopes to dish out in the 1.9k swim-90k bike-21k run distance race, the lone pro event slated in this year’s series of triathlon races organized by The IRONMAN Group/Sunrise Events, Inc.
Now based in Dubai, Azevedo dominated the 2019 IM 70.3 Shanghai and topped his country’s Middle Distance Triathlon National Championships last year.
But the 30-year-old does expect a stiff challenge form a host of top-notch rivals, including Chang, who ruled the IM Taitung in record fashion (3:52.48) and topped the Taipei Triathlon National Championships, both last year.
Also in the fold are Aussies Matthew Tonge and Nick Carling, runner-up in last year’s World Triathlon Long Distance Championship Samorin, Spain’s Eneko Elosegi and Juampe Garcia, Jayden Kuijpers of New Zealand, Michael Raelert and Ognjen Stojanovic of Germany and Japan’s Kaito Tohara.