Athlete’s enjoy new style of racing The action was fast and furious in a hot and humid Lausanne for this weekend’s ITU Dextro Energy World Championship Series Events. There were three Irish athletes racing in Saturday’s Sprint Distance World Championships, Bryan Keane, Conor Murphy and Amy Wolfe and a team of 4 racing in Sunday Team Triathlon World Championships.
All three had creditable outings with Murphy placing 47th and Keane placing 50th out of 75. Keane swam among the one large pack in Lake Geneva, and following the hilly and technical four lap bike course, where he was required to work hard bridging between the third and second cycle packs, exited T2 for the run course in 47th position. The searing heat took its toll though and Keane slipped to 50th at the finish line.
TI High Performance Development athlete, Portadown’s Conor Murphy was lucky to get a call up to the Men’s Sprint race today, following the late withdrawal of Germany’s Jan Frodeno. Murphy marked his ITU debut in style with a very commendable 46th place finish in the field of 75. Murphy came across the line ecstatic with the result: "I’m delighted, I loved it!" he said.
The men’s race was won by defending champion Jonny Brownlee who out sprinted Javier Gomez to take his second Sprint Distance World Championship. Keane later commented "whilst I’m disappointed with the result, I’ll take the positives out of the performance in my continued recovery from last year’s accident".
Amy Wolfe raced on Saturday afternoon and finished 58th in what was her ITU racing debut. “I was pleased with the result, the girls out there were just so powerful, but I loved every minute of it.” The women’s race was equally hard fought with a number of girls in contention in the final kilometre. Chile’s Barbara Riveros Diaz out sprinted the rest to take her first Sprint Distance World Title.
Sunday saw 35 team’s lining up for a relatively new event which is looking for inclusion in the 2016 Olympics.
The Irish team was made up of Bryan Keane, Conor Murphy, Amy Wolfe and Joyce Wolfe who performed admirably against top class opposition placing 20th overall. All enjoyed this style of racing very much and are looking forward to racing again. Amy Wolfe said "to have been selected by Triathlon Ireland to represent at the individual and team sprint world championships was a thrilling and daunting experience, the whole team had a huge sense of pride lining up with previous and prospective Olympians and wearing the Irish kit. The racing was fast and furious but we felt we rose to the occasion and delivered gutsy performances".
The Team Triathlon was won by pre race favourites Great Britain with their squad of Alistair and Jonny Brownlee, Helen Jenkins and Jodie Stimpson.
