Over 400 athletes from beginners to some of New Zealand’s top triathletes took to the lake at the new Pegasus town development for the swim start of the inaugural “House of Travel” Triathlon Festival on Sunday morning.
With five separate races beginning with the "UVEX" Pegasus Classic and finishing with the "Sports Doctors" Elite Cup, the festival provided a great opportunity for the crowd to get up close with the sport of triathlon.
The Festival is the brainchild of Christchurch coach and former pro-triathlete John Newsom.
"I wanted to put on a great show for everyone and on the whole I think we succeeded in doing that. The immediate feedback has been extremely positive and it was great for all those that had competed in the morning to hang about and watch the exciting elite race"
The event catered for all ages and abilities with the youngest competitors just 9 years old able to swim, bike and run the same course as ITU stars Andrew Hewitt and Nicky Samuels, Ironman triathlete Bryan Rhodes and other top professional New Zealand triathletes.
"The calibre of the elite field was just awesome. We need our stars to race on home soil so the up and comers can compete against them and the kids have something to aspire to. I'm committed to improving prize money year on year and I want to make this one of the biggest triathlons in New Zealand"
Whilst most of the morning was given over to the age group races the highlight of the festival was without doubt the elite race.
The men's race was wide open at the start with an impressive field of men vying for the title of the inaugural race. Out of the swim a small breakaway formed with Tom Davison, Dylan McNiece and Tony Dodds. The trio pushed the pace throughout and forced the fancied Martin Van Barneveld and other athletes to ride equally hard in there pursuit. The feedback from the bike course was very positive "nice and technical and one of the smoothest rides in New Zealand" commented Dodds.
Off the bike and the leading trio had built up around a 30 second advantage over their chasers. Dodds dropped the hammer straight out of transition and went on to win in relative ease. The battle for 2nd was a tighter affair with the hard charging Van Barneveld slowly eating into Davison who held 2nd for most the run. The catch was made at around the 4km mark but Davison hung on, just loosing out in the final 100m with Van Barneveld taking 2nd.
The women's race was dominated by race favourite Andrea Hewitt who came out of the swim neck and neck with Penny Hayes. Her principle rival, Nicky Samuels from Wanaka, made a tactical blunder that cost her critical time. Samuels chose not to wear a wetsuit in the swim in an obvious attempt to try and rip through transition and break away from Hewitt. However she lost too much time in the swim without a wetsuit she only started the bike in 4th place. When she did catch Hewitt on the bike she did not have the power to ride away. Onto the run and Hewitt eased to the win with Samuels 2nd and long course specialist Julia Grant in 3rd
Elite Results
Men
1. TONY DODDS (wanaka) - 47:14
2. MARTIN VAN BARNWELD (wellington) - 00:47:42
3. TOM DAVISON (Chch0 - 00:47:48
4. HARRISON DEAN (Nelson) -48:14
5. DYLAN MCNEICE (Chch) -48:39
6. MIKE PHILLIPS (Chch) - 49:18
7. AXEL REISER (Chch) - 49:29
8. CRAIG SAVAGE (Chch) - 49:41
9. ROB CREASY (Dunedin) - 49:46
10. ANDREW BLACK (Chch) - 49:59
Women
1. ANDREA HEWITT (Chch) - 51:28
2. NICKY SAMUELS (Wanaka) - 52:12
3. JULIA GRANT (Chch) - 54:31
4. LAURA WOOD (Chch) - 55:24
5. PENNY HAYES (Southland) - 56:27
In the races earlier in the day Zac Barber won the "UVEX" Pegasus Classic from Greg Fraine and Andrew Abahkan whilst Emma Meyer took out the woman's race from Leonie Kaywood and Gail Harvey Haywood.
The "Fendalton Eye Clinic" Teams Challenge had three divisions (men's women's and mixed) and were won by team DMG (Geoff Scott, Manu Clarkson, Danny Carmine), The Pretenders (Kate Miller, Kimberly Jupp, Laura Verry) and EY's Dream Team (Kate Myers, James Howard, Matthew Hunt) respectively.
In the "Newstalk ZB" Try a Tri Marshall Lowy and Sharon Broughy took line honours.
The "John Bull Cycles" Kids Challenge had two age divisions. Winners of the 9-11 years were Hugo Jones and Arlia Schurr with Rainer Pye and Jess Kikstra taking the 12-14 years titles.
Results of all the day's racing can be found on the HOT Triathlon Festival site – www.triathlonfestival.co.nz.
[I took a few photos of the event: Triathlon Festival Photos part 1, Triathlon Festival Photos part 2 - Dave]
