With Olympic gold medalist Alex Yee (GBR) out of the race because he was required to report for jury duty, it seemed as though New Zealand’s Hayden Wilde would have an excellent chance for a third-straight supertri win in Toulouse, France today. Portugal’s Vasco Vilaca and Germany’s Tim Hellwig missed that memo, though, and would lead the way at today’s race, relegating Wilde to third place in a three-way sprint.
In the women’s race, though, there was no touching Great Britain’s Georgia Taylor-Brown, who made it three in a row with a spirted final run that pulled her clear of American Taylor Spivey.
Taylor-Brown runs clear
By the time the lead women hit the second of the three consecutive min-tri legs there were four women out in front – Taylor-Brown, Spivey, along with Brits Kate Waugh and Jess Fullagar. Taylor-Brown would wait for the final run leg to put her stamp on the race, pulling clear for a four-second win over Spivey, with Waugh rounding out the top three.
Olympic gold medalist Cassandre Beaugrand initially looked to finish fourth, but was later DQ’d for a helmet strap violation.
“When you’re at the top and winning, you definitely want more,” said Taylor-Brown after the race. “That’s three wins going into the final in NEOM and I feel quite happy and safe. I told myself I’d go for a non-wetsuit [first swim] ahead of the race and I stuck to that. I knew it was going to be cold and that I’d lose time, but I’m happy with that decision.”
Vilaca breaks from a group of six
There were six men who dominated the men’s racing, including Vilaca, Hellwig, Wilde, France’s Leo Berger and Vincent Luis, and Japan’s Kenji Nener. The group stayed together until the final run leg, with Vilaca and Hellwig each out sprinting Wilde, who was slowed when his shoe came off, to make up the podium. It was Vilaca’s first supertri win.
“I’m just so happy,” Vilaca said. “Finishing next to Tim, who did an amazing run of that last leg, so we could finish side-by-side to bring the points home for Stars & Stripes, means I’m over the moon with this result. I really struggled on the first swim because of the cold. But, from then on, I just gave it everything I had to get to the front. I’m happy to show what I’ve been working for today.”
“I actually thought I had it in the bag, but my shoe fell off halfway,” said Wilde. “It was pretty aggressive on the swim as well and I was sick of some of the athletes pushing me around. I had to give some back to them. It was really important that I showed up here to score some points for my team and to keep my rivals [for the overall title] at bay, so I’m pretty happy with today.”
The post Georgia Taylor-Brown nails third straight supertri race, while Vasco Vilaca foils Hayden Wilde’s go at three-peat appeared first on Triathlon Magazine Canada.