|
Current Junior world champion Kirsten Sweetland of Canada has just won the 2007 Richards Bay BG Triathlon World Cup in South Africa. The 18-year old Canadian’s time of 2 hours 3 minutes and 32 seconds was 15 seconds better then her closest rival, 2000 Olympic bronze medalist, Magali Di marco Messmer of Switzerland. Di marco Messmer was able to hold off a charging Christiane Pilz of Germany at the line for the silver medal. Pilz rounded out the podium in third, with another strong run, only two seconds down.
Calm, clear conditions welcomed 51 women to the starting pontoon as the athletes hit the water for the fourth round of the 2007 BG Triathlon World Cup series. Immediately in the first 300 metres two distinct packs would form and stay together over the opening two-lap, 1,500 metre swim. The lead group of Sweetland, Di marco Messmer, Pilz, Joelle Franzmann of Germany, Elizabeth May of Luxembourg, Kate Roberts of South Africa and Nicola Spirig of Switzerland would be joined by another 11 athletes within the first 5km of the bike course to form one large group off the front.
The chase group, containing many top contenders including Andrea Whitcombe of Great Britain and Nadia Cortassa of Italy, would be unable to organize themselves and continued to lose time to the lead group. Over the 40 kilometre bike course, little would change as the lead group continued to put time into their chasers and would eventually enter the second transition almost two minutes up.
Sweetland would immediately move to the lead of the runners and never look back, running 36:12 to stamp her arrival on the world cup scene. With the win, Sweetland is the youngest Canadian woman to win a world cup race and moves up to second in the BG Triathlon World Cup rankings.
Di marco Messmer crossed in second position after out-sprinting Pilz at the line, joyous of her first world cup podium in seven years.
2007 Richards Bay BG Triathlon World Cup – Elite Women results
1. SWEETLAND, Kirsten (CAN) 2:03:32
2. Di marco Messmer, Magali (SUI) 2:03:47
3. PILZ, Christiane (GER) 2:03:49
4. MAY, Elizabeth (LUX) 2:04:02
5. SPIRIG, Nicola (SUI) 2:04:25
6. WANG, Hongni (CHN) 2:04:36
7. IDE, Juri (JPN) 2:05:12
8. FRANZMANN, Joelle (GER) 2:05:31
9. ROBERTS, Kate (RSA) 2:05:43
10. ZEIGER, Joanna (USA) 2:06:06
Full results are available at: .
In this photo released by the International Triathlon Union, the top three women of the BG Triathlon World Cup Women's race celebrate their success in Richards Bay, South Africa Sunday May 13, 2007. From left to right are; second placed Magali Di marco Messmer of Switzerland, race winner Kirsten Sweetland of Canada and third placed athlete Christiane Pilz of Germany. (AP Photo/ITU, Frank Wechsel)
|
Know someone else who's interested in running and triathlon?