Posted: August 18, 2005

Athletics: Triathlete Galindez debuts at half-marathon

RIO DE JANEIRO (15 AUGUST 2005) South America’s most well-known triathlete, Oscar Galindez (www.OscarGalindez.com), sponsored by Reebok, Ironman Wetsuits, Oakley, Memorial, Zipp, and Profile Design, made his foray into the running world last weekend, finishing the International Half-Marathon of Rio de Janeiro in 1 hour, 12 minutes and 37 seconds, a minute faster than expected. It was the former Olympian, duathlon world champion, Ironman and many half-ironman events champion’s first ever half-marathon not attached to swim and bike efforts.

Galindez was invited by Brazil’s running federation, CBAt, to compete against top athletes from 12 South and Central American nations. "I spent the last 24 hours beside the great athletes of this sport and it was so cool! I visited mostly with the stars from Kenya,” he said. Kenyan Biwott Kipkoski won the race from São Conrado to Flamengo Beach in 1:02.44.

Galindez adopted the idea to participate in some separate swim, bike and run races – modalities that comprise the triathlon – with the objective to improve his training for September’s final stage of the Troféu Brasil short-course triathlon series, and for October’s Ironman Triathlon World Championships, in Hawaii. The half-marathon was Galindez’s second challenge this season outside of the traditional triathlon format. On July 31st, he raced in Brazil’s first-ever off-road triathlon, in Ilhabela, a city in Brazil’s São Paulo state, finishing in fourth and not far behind winner and XTERRA superstar Conrad Stoltz. "It was an interesting experience mainly because the mountain bike is not my forte,” he said.