Currie exhausted but proud

German Patrick Lange has broken one of the triathlon’s most coveted barriers, becoming the first to better eight hours at the Kona Ironman world championship on Sunday with Kiwi Braden Currie a brave fifth.

Currie was so exhausted he needed an intravenous drip inserted after the race. His was the sixth-fastest time in event history. He was third at one point on the final run.

‘‘I love seeing what is humanly possible of me. I probably could have eased up and played a safe card and kept a better pace,’’ Currie told Sportzhub.

‘‘I wanted to see if I could race Patrick – at the end of the day he’s the best in the world right now and he’s shown how dominant he is.’’

Defending champion Lange finished the 3.8km swim, 180km cycle and 42.2km run in 7hr 52mins 39secs, improving his race record by nine minutes as unusually benign conditions contributed to extremely fast racing.

In his second Ironman World Championship, Wanaka-based Currie came close to the coveted mark himself, finishing in 8:04:41. He had led at one stage in 2017, but a drafting penalty dropped him to 30th.

‘‘I absolutely gave it everything I had in the tank today. To be honest I’m really proud of the result. I held tough,’’ Currie said after the race.

Belgian Bart Aernouts was second in 7:56:41, followed by Scot David Mcnamee 8:01:09; American Tim O’donnell 8:03:17 and Currie, who held off Matt Russell by four seconds.

Currie held on to third place until around 16km into the marathon, when Aernouts passed him. By the 32km split the heat was beginning to wear Currie down and he slipped to fourth behind Mcnamee.

Currie battled neck and neck with eventual fourth place finisher Tim O’donnell for several kilometres before the American eventually clawed away with about 5km left.

Swiss ace Daniela Ryf won a fourthstraight women’s title and torched her race record by 20 minutes with 8:26:18.

Ryf recovered from a jellyfish sting before the race start to also break the women’s bike course record by 18 minutes.

Englishwoman Lucy Charles finished second just over 10 minutes adrift.