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Smet and Richmond – Two New World Cup Title Holders
Corner Brook, Newfoundland: For
immediate release:
A full week of multi-sport festivities culminated today in Corner Brook,
Newfoundland with the ITU Corner Brook World Cup Triathlon. The weather for the 3 lap swim, 6 lap bike
and 4 lap run was overcast and windy, with water temperatures at 18oC,
mandating the use of wetsuits.
In the
women’s event, Anneliese Heard of Great Britain, the 2000 and 2001 Junior World
Champion led the field through the 1500m swim and up the steep 500m run to
the transition area in a time of 20:43.
Eleven seconds behind her was Canada’s Jill Savege,
with Australia’s Pip Taylor and Annabel Luxford, Belgium’s Kathleen Smet and Britain’s Jessica Harrison a few seconds
back.
Although
the six athletes appeared to form a tight group at the front, Savege was dropped on the first lap, as Luxford decided to go it alone and went off the
front.
Luxford powered her way over one of the most difficult courses
on the circuit and extended her lead over each lap. The chase pack of Smet, Heard, Harrison and Taylor worked well together, but lost
valuable time on each of the 2 hills on course. The second chase pack included Canada’s Tara Ross, Savege,
Carol
Montgomery and Gillian Moody, as well as Andrea Whitcombe
of Britain.
Mirinda Carfrae of
Australia missed the chasers and road the
entire 40km alone.
By the
bike to run transition, Luxford’s lead was 90
seconds as she docked her bike and swept onto the run course. At this point the 2004 Under 23 World
Champion appeared well on her way to capturing her first World Cup
title. However the 2002 and 2000
European Champion Kathleen Smet had other plans for the young Australian. Smet and Taylor flew out of the transition
together with Heard and Harrison several strides behind.
At this
point the second chase pack of Savege, Ross,
Montgomery, Moody and Whitcombe were over 4 minutes
behind the leader.
On the
first lap Smet and Taylor took 25 seconds out of Luxford,
as Smet made her move on Taylor and began to reel in the young
leader. At the halfway point Smet was
just 19 seconds behind Luxford and overtook her on
the 3rd lap. As they
started the bell lap, Smet had a 14 second lead over Luxford,
with Taylor a further 9 seconds behind. Meanwhile Andrea Whitcombe
was eating up the course on her way to posting the fastest 10km run time of
the day. She caught Harrison on the 2nd lap and
was closing in on Heard.
In 2002
Kathleen Smet was 3rd at the Corner Brook World Cup – her best
World Cup performance. But today there
was only one step that would satisfy her, and that was the one at the
top. She ran a wonderful last lap
urged on by the thousands of spectators that lined course to take the win 30
seconds ahead of Pip Taylor. Annabel Luxford easily held off Andrea Whitcombe
for the last step on the podium.
In her
post-race interview, Kathleen Smet said, “I’ve been in the mountains training
very hard for the Olympic Games. I’ve
lost 10 pounds, and am very happy at how that has affected my running.”
Top
10 results are:
|
Place
|
Name
|
Country
|
Finish
|
|
1
|
SMET Kathleen
|
BEL
|
02:08:11
|
|
2
|
TAYLOR Pip
|
AUS
|
02:08:41
|
|
3
|
LUXFORD Annabel
|
AUS
|
02:09:04
|
|
4
|
WHITCOMBE Andrea
|
GBR
|
02:10:34
|
|
5
|
HEARD Anneliese
|
GBR
|
02:11:23
|
|
6
|
SAVEGE Jill
|
CAN
|
02:12:16
|
|
7
|
MONTGOMERY Carol
|
CAN
|
02:13:00
|
|
8
|
HARRISON Jessica
|
GBR
|
02:13:42
|
|
9
|
MOODY Gillian
|
CAN
|
02:14:33
|
|
10
|
CARFRAE Mirinda
|
AUS
|
02:16:29
|
For the
men’s event, the sun came out, the wind died away and the thermometer shot
up.
Nathan Richmond
of New Zealand and Marko Albert of Estonia, both heading to Athens in August, moved to the front on
the first lap of the swim, but were not able to get away. Levi Maxwell of Australia, making his first appearance in
a World Cup event since his 3rd place finish at the 2000 Hawaii
World Cup led the field up the big hill and onto his bike. He tried to get away on the first lap, but
Richmond, newcomer David Dellows of Australia, British team-mates Marc Jenkins
and Richard Allen and a strong team from the USA including Joe Umphenour, Andy Kelsey, Michael Smedley, Seth Wealing and Victor Plata, got themselves
organized and soon reeled Maxwell back in.
The
chase pack was the duo of Mark Fretta of the USA and Clark Ellice of New Zealand, both missing the train as it
pulled away from the transition.
The lead
group electrified the crowd with their energy and the effectiveness of their peleton. But it was the “brave-heart” like effort by
Mark Fretta as he dropped Ellice and bridged the
gap to the leaders on the second lap who won their hearts.
With Ellice alone in no-man’s land, the strong pack led by Frederick vanLierde
of Belgium, with Gilberto Gonzalez of Venezuela, Christoph
O’Donnell of the USA and Canadian team-mates Sean
Bechtel and Nick Hastie took on the hunt for the
leaders.
Through the
third and fourth lap, the Americans worked their magic at the front, until Joe Umphenour and Mark Fretta saw a window
open and they dashed through to break from the group on the 5th
lap. Although adding great excitement
to the event, the rest of the group was too wily for them and by the bell lap
they were all together again. Michael Smedley and Marko Albert pulled the leaders through the
final lap with Umphenour and Fretta resting their legs after their valiant
effort.
Maxwell,
Richmond, and Dellow were the first through the
bike to run transition, with Albert, Allen, Umphenour, Kelsey out after them
in that order. Dellow
moved to the front on the first lap as Richmond, Plata and Umphenour calmly
pulled the 2 Aussies back on the first lap.
Mark Fretta moved into 5th after his incredible effort on
the bike.
Through
the 2nd and 3rd lap, Richmond and Plata ran together at the
front with Umphenour and Dellow dropping back a few
seconds. As they disappeared down the
hill on the final lap, the finish-line judges prepared for a sprint finish,
but a hungry Nathan Richmond did not let this happen. He slowly pulled away
from his challengers to post his first World Cup victory with a 7 second
margin over Joe Umphenour who passed Plata in the final straight – both reaching
the World Cup podium for the first time.
Dellow was 4th and Fretta rounded
out the top 5.
After
the race, Nathan Richmond was overwhelmed by his victory. He said, “This win proves that I am a
worthy member of the New Zealand Olympic team.” He, along with World Champion Bevan
Docherty and Hamish Carter will make up one of the strongest teams at the
Games.
Top 10 Results:
|
1
|
RICHMOND Nathan
|
NZL
|
01:56:33
|
|
2
|
UMPHENOUR Joe
|
USA
|
01:56:40
|
|
3
|
PLATA Victor
|
USA
|
01:56:48
|
|
4
|
DELLOW David
|
AUS
|
01:57:02
|
|
5
|
FRETTA Mark
|
USA
|
01:57:11
|
|
6
|
MAXWELL Levi
|
AUS
|
01:57:40
|
|
7
|
WEALING Seth
|
USA
|
01:57:48
|
|
8
|
ALBERT Marko
|
EST
|
01:58:22
|
|
9
|
ALLEN Richard
|
GBR
|
01:59:51
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|
10
|
JENKINS Marc
|
GBR
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02:00:15
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All of
the results, photos, stories and videos are available on www.triathlon.org, and for high
resolution photos, please contact ituhdq@triathlon.org
Action
continues next weekend at the Salford ITU World
Cup, then on to Tiszaujvaros the weekend after. Be sure to stay tuned to www.triathlon.org for more live
coverage.
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