Posted: May 15, 2005

Triathlon: Samantha Warriner and Courtney Atkinson Win Ishigaki World Cup

Ishigaki, Japan, 15 May 2005:

Loretta Harrop of Australia who is the current ITU World Cup leader after winning the Mooloolaba World Cup and placing second in Honolulu, set a fearsome pace through the 2 lap, 1500m swim segment and then road the entire 6-lap, 40 kilometre bike course along, increasing her lead as the kilometres ticked away. The 28oC air temperatures with an energy-sapping 76% humidity appeared to do nothing to slow the feisty Aussie.

ITU’s newly introduced primes for the first out of the swim, and fastest through laps 2 and 5 of the bike were also easily snatched by Harrop.

The only ones to challenge Harrop through the swim and bike were Laura Bennett of the USA and the 2000 World Champion, Nicole Hackett of Australia. They stayed in contact through the swim and then teamed up for the bike, but made little time on the leader, dropping back to 1:20 at the bike to run transition.

Once on the run, Harrop’s energy faded, as her win on the difficult Mooloolaba World Cup course 2 weeks ago started to take its toll. Hackett and Bennett made little impact on Harrop’s lead through the first lap of the 3 lap run, but the great runners in the event such as Great Britain’s Michelle Dillon and Japan’s Akiko Sekine and Kiyomi Niwata started to move through the field, making up for many lost moments during the swim and bike.

But the surprise of the day came from Samantha Warriner of New Zealand. Due to lack of funding after the Athens Olympic Games, Warriner was forced to return to a full time teaching job and squeeze her training in between classes. Facing a 45 second deficit after the swim, Warriner was lucky to catch a hard working group on the bike that formed the second chase pack behind Hackett and Bennett. She came off the bike with almost a 2 minute deficit on Harrop, but once on her feet she quickly set her sights on the leader and by the end of the first lap she found herself in 2nd place and in the hunt for her first podium finish, let along a World Cup title.

On the second lap of the run Warriner caught Harrop and ran for home, occasionally glancing nervously over her shoulder for the fast approaching Japanese duo of Niwata and Sekine, as first Harrop and then Bennett and Hackett fell further back in the field.

Warriner made a little history in Ishigaki by grabbing the first World Cup title, not only for herself, but for any woman from New Zealand. Kiyomi Niwata was 2nd and Akiko Sekine was 3rd, much to the delight of the home-country fans. Nicole Hackett posted her best World Cup performance since giving birth to her first child last year, and Michelle Dillon rounded out the top 5

Women's Results:
1        WARRINER        Samantha        02:00:39
2        NIWATA        Kiyomi        02:00:59
3        SEKINE        Akiko        02:01:31
4        HACKETT        Nicole        02:02:10
5        DILLON        Michelle        02:02:40
6        NAKANISHI        Machiko        02:02:49
7        CARFRAE        Mirinda        02:03:12
8        BENNETT        Laura        02:03:54
9        TAYLOR        Pip        02:04:20
10        KUTSUNA        Shizuka        02:04:36

The men’s event featured a great match-up between the Aussie and American men, with World Cup leader Hunter Kemper coming head to head with the likes of Greg Bennett, Simon Thompson, Courtney Atkinson, Craig Alexander and Bryce Quirk.

Kemper took an unprecedented lead through the first lap of the swim until his team-mate Andy Potts overtook him and exited the swim with a 15 second lead over Kemper, who was followed closely by Tsukasa Hirano of Japan, Australian team-mates Chris Hill and David Dellow, Dirk Bockel of Luxembourg, and American team-mates Joe Umphenour, Matt Reed and Doug Friman.

A huge pack of over 20 men emerged from the swim to bike transition and stayed together until the 2nd lap when the newly implemented prime lap really shook things up. Dirk Bockel out-sprinted Dan Alterman of Israel in a thrilling attack and things were never the same after that. By the 4th lap David Dellow and Junichi Yamamoto of Japan had broken away from the big pack as Seth Wealing of the USA worked desperately hard at the front of the now disorganized big pack to create some semblance of working order. By the bell lap, Switzerland’s Didier Broccard had pulled Chris Hill and Yuichi Hosoda up to Dellow and Yamamoto and they stayed together through the final lap.

Broccard was the first off the bike and onto the run followed by Hill, Dellow, Hosoda and Yunichi, as Matt Reed entered the transition all alone a few seconds later. He was followed by Hunter Kemper at the front of the big pack.

Chris Hill moved to the front for the first 2 kilometres, but was quickly reeled in by team-mates Atkinson, Thompson, Alexander and Quirk, along with Andrew Johns of Great Britain and Hunter Kemper.

Broccard took a brief turn at the front, as did Matt Reed, but then a trio of Atkinson, Kemper and Plata got together and emerged through the field to take over the lead. They stayed together through the final lap of the run with Atkinson dropping the American challengers in the final kilometers. Kemper retained his role at the top of the World Cup standings by placing second, with Plata 3rd. Aussie team-mates Craig Alexander and Simon Thompson were 4th and 5th.

Men's results:
1        Atkinson        Courtney        01:47:08
2        Kemper        Hunter        01:47:15
3        Plata        Victor        01:47:24
4        Alexander        Craig        01:47:33
5        Thompson        Simon        01:47:39
6        Reed        Matthew        01:48:07
7        Quirk        Bryce        01:48:22
8        Johns        Andrew        01:48:26
9        Kahlefeldt        Brad        01:48:35
10        Brocard        Didier        01:48:41

The podium awards featured a photo moment with the Dr. Ohama, Mayor of Ishigaki to commemorate the 10th staging of the Ishigaki World Cup and his slogan for the World Cup, “Go For World Peace.”

An interesting side-note to the 10 years of World Cup racing on this idealistic island in the South China sea is that of the 60 World Cup medal awarded over the 10 years, Australian athletes have won an impressive 28 of them, and all but 5 of the gold medals have gone to that country which has produced more World Cup and World Champions than any other. Courtney Atkinson played a role in keeping those odds alive today.

The event’s live coverage on www.triathlon.org was enjoyed by thousands around the world featuring “ITU’s voices of Triathlon, Jackie Gallagher and Barrie Shepley.

For complete stories, results and photos of David Leah visit www.triathlon.org.