Belgian Marino Vanhoenacker, formerly fastest long distance triathlete of the world is the latest addition to Austria's pewag Racing Team until at least 2015. Second notable name is Germany's 2005 IRONMAN Hawaii winner Faris Al-Sultan and a few other upcoming athletes like Lis Gruber, Vinzent Rieß, Flo Kriegl, Daniel Niederreiter and Rene Vallant. 27 more elite amateurs complete the current team structure.
The pewag Racing Team is beside Redbull's single athlete roster and Power Horse's fully stacked team the second Austrian team with international capabilities for winning major triathlon events. Pewag itself is well known for chain manufacturing like snow chains, industrial chain systems, hoist chains, conveyeur technique, tire protection chains, etc. A cycling product is the company missing as of now - but you never know.
Looking quite relaxed: Faris Al-Sultan is getting company in form of Belgian cycling powerhorse Marino Vanhoenacker. Screenshot: pewag austria GmbH |
Some challenges are ahead of Vanhoenacker. He's facing injury trouble and may fail to qualify for IRONMAN Hawaii. He raced with a fatigue fracture in the pelvis area IRONMAN Frankfurt to allocate enough points for Kona. One or two more 70.3 races with some points (Kona Pro Ranking; KPR) would guarantee him his spot, but it's likely neither wise to qualify with injury or race with one the hot Lava fields.