Weather and course lead to great Ironman

It was a record day Sunday at Ford Ironman Arizona.

Both the men's and women's course records fell as athletes enjoyed the moderate temperatures and flat course in and around Tempe.

Slideshow: Ford Ironman Arizona race

Triathlons become a way of life

Jordan Rapp won his second Iroman title of the year, winning the men's title on Sunday in a time of eight hours, 13 minutes and 35 seconds. The New York native, who broke the course record by 41 seconds, also broke his own bike split record on this course by four minutes, finishing the 112-mile ride in 4:22.30.

The triathlon begins with a 2.4-mile swim and concludes with a 26.2-mile run.

"I obviously felt good on the bike, but with Iroman you never know what can happen," said Rapp, who also won Ironman Canada this past August and is set to get married next week.

"To win twice this year...I don't know what to say. It's a great feeling."

Rapp swam a 50:49 and ran the marathon in 2:55.45.

Canadian native Samantha McGlone earned the women's championship - her first at the Ironman distance - in 9:09.19.

She also used a bike course record time (4:56.48) to grab the overall title.

"It's great to get my first win in what I consider my hometown course," said McGlone, who now lives in Tucson. "I didn't have a good swim, and I never really felt like I was comfortable until the last four or five miles. But I had enough, I guess."

McGlone finished the swim in 58.58 and the run in 3:10.10.

Each winner receives $8,500 of the $50,000 professional purse.

Rapp consistently looked over his shoulder down the stretch even though he was more than five minutes in front of runner-up T.J. Tollakson.

"It's never easy out there, and I didn't feel confident until the last 200 meters," Rapp said.

Tollakson, a native of Iowa who also lives part-time in Tucson, said he tried to best to reel in Rapp, but eventually had to fight off third-place finisher Tortsen Abel, of Germany.

"I go into every race wanting to win, but coming off Hawaii (the world championship race which was held in mid-October) I didn't know how my legs would respond," said Tollakson, who beat Abel by 16 seconds.

"Jordan just had too much, and Abel was closing fast. To get second is a great day for me."

Tollakson (8:20.23) and Abel (8:20.39) both broke the previous course record of 8:20.56.

"Overall it was a good day," said Abel, who also trained in Tucson for a few weeks leading to the race. "This is a much more tough course than people think. There was a good head-wind by the second lap of the bike. And the sidewalk running really starts to beat-up your legs."

McGlone, who has a second-place finish in Hawaii in 2007 to her credit, beat runner-up and Montana native Linsey Corbin by more than four minutes. Corbin finished in a personal-record time of 9:13.46.

"Samantha was so strong all day, so for me to finish second and get a PR is incredible," Corbin said.

In the men's field, Scottsdale's Lewis Elliott finished in 9:00.14 to finish 15th in the professional field.

"I'm happy with the time, but to come so close to 9 hours and just miss it is frustrating," Elliott said. "I had a lot of trouble on the run. Overall it was okay."

Another Scottsdale resident, Kevin Taddonio, was the third overall amateur to finish and the top male in the 24-29-year-old division. He finished in 9:07:49.

The top overall amateur was California's Sami Inkinen, who finished an impressive 8:51:08.