Jelle Geens won his sixth middle distance race at Ironman 70.3 Port Macquarie this weekend, finishing in a time of 3:44:34.

After being second out of the water, Geens pushed to the front on the bike, allowing his closest competitors, Roland Crantock and Vincent Groesser, to get no closer than one minute and 1:17 behind, respectively. On the concluding marathon, Kieran Storch was the only athlete who briefly looked capable of challenging Geens on the run. But by the 8 kilometre mark, the advantage for Geens had stretched to two minutes and continued to grow as he remained firmly in control all the way to the finishing banner. Storch followed in second, 2:31 behind, with Mitchell Kibby completing the podium in third, 4:58 back.

With an early season goal of qualifying for and racing in the Ironman World Championship in Kona, the reigning two-time Ironman 70.3 World Champion was forced to shelf that plan. In his first Ironman attempt in Texas early this year, Geens was forced to pull out after 30 kilometres in the run. Undeterred and open to learning and improving, Geens held steady to his objective and attempted a second qualification push at Ironman Lake Placid in July. However, he was forced to concede when he was diagnosed with a Grade 2 femoral shaft stress reaction in June.

Geens worked hard through the summer to regain his top form and, 134 days following Ironman Texas, Geens returned to competitive action at Ironman 70.3 Zell am See in late August alongside a new goal of a three-peat 70.3 World Championship in Nice.

While Geens was disappointed with not taking the win in Zell am See, he was happy to be healthy and racing again. Moving forward from his second place in Zell am See, Geens admitted that he would need to be a lot better to contend for another win at the 70.3 World Championship in Nice.

Two weeks later in Nice, although his bid for a third consecutive 70.3 World Championship fell short, he raced to a podium behind Hayden Wilde and Kristian Blummenfelt.

Reflecting on the race, Geens shared how proud he was to reach the podium after the injury setback early in the year. More importantly, he was excited about the form he was building heading into his final two races of the season.

That optimism proved well founded. Just six days later Geens finished runner up to Wilde at the French Riviera T100 before heading to his new home in Port Macquarie, where he finally returned to the top of the podium with gold at Ironman 70.3 Port Macquarie.