Aquathlon Medals Galore For Kiwis At Triathlon World Champs

Aquathlon Medals Galore In Great Start For Kiwis At Triathlon World Championships

It was a great start to the ITU World Triathlon Championships for the New Zealanders overnight Wednesday night New Zealand time, with the age group team delivering 2 new World Champions and 5 podium results while in the elites, Maddie Dillon (Auckland) won gold in the elite U23, Elise Salt (Auckland) silver in the elite juniors (U19), Rebecca Clarke finished 4th in the elite women and Cam Todd finished 7th in the elite U23 men.

The results have proved a great confidence boost for the New Zealanders in London for the elite and age group world championships this weekend, with athletes set to compete over sprint and standard distance in age group events, and standard distance in elite racing on the same Hyde Park course used at the London Olympic Games last year.

Dillon was delighted with her race and to hear the national anthem ring around Hyde Park.

“It was really amazing to hear the national anthem and to stand on the podium and get the gold medal was really something.  It is such a good feeling; it is really good to be on the podium again after such a late start to the year with the broken elbow so yeah, to be on the podium, especially winning is such an amazing feeling.”

Salt too was thrilled to be mixing it with the best in the world but ran out of real estate to catch the gold medal winning Russian.

“It feels really good; it was great to stand on the podium for the first time in a world champs race. I was really happy with my run, I had an alright swim but I came out a wee bit behind some of the other juniors so I knew I had to run them down if I wanted to get on the podium. They were in my sights out of transition, I was probably about 50m behind, I caught up to them and ran past them. I could see the girl from Russia about 200m in front of me and at the end it was down to about 10 seconds so it was a good run for me.”

Headlining a great start for the age group team were gold medals to Rachel Hamill, Hamilton (women’s 40-44) and Alec Hill, North Harbour (men’s 80-84) with medals also to Stephen Farrell, North Harbour (silver men’s 50-54), Alan Lennon, North Harbour (silver men’s 60-64) and Judith Taylor, Canterbury (bronze women’s 55-59).

NZ team manager Brenna Roband was proud to report on a great day’s racing from the Kiwis.

“Overall a great days racing and an awesome start for New Zealand. Rachel defended her 2012 title, Alec loved the course and thoroughly enjoyed the race and now can't wait for the sprint on Friday! 

“Overall the athletes all enjoyed it, with a few comments around the size of the waves in the Serpentine and it being chaotic in the swim but that is a World Championship for you! 

“We also had our youngest athlete in the team Ioan Fuller (Manawatu) who is 15 compete today in his first world champs - he was tired after the race and found the pace fast on the run but really enjoyed it!”

For a link to all race results, elite and age group, CLICK HERE

ENDS

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