Loretta Harrop of Australia who is the current ITU World Cup
leader after winning the Mooloolaba World Cup and placing second in Honolulu,
set a fearsome pace through the 2 lap, 1500m swim segment and then road the
entire 6-lap, 40 kilometre bike course along, increasing her lead as the kilometres
ticked away. The 28oC air temperatures with an energy-sapping 76% humidity appeared
to do nothing to slow the feisty Aussie.
ITUs newly introduced primes for the first out of the swim, and fastest
through laps 2 and 5 of the bike were also easily snatched by Harrop.
The only ones to challenge Harrop through the swim and bike were Laura Bennett
of the USA and the 2000 World Champion, Nicole Hackett of Australia. They stayed
in contact through the swim and then teamed up for the bike, but made little
time on the leader, dropping back to 1:20 at the bike to run transition.
Once on the run, Harrops energy faded, as her win on the difficult Mooloolaba
World Cup course 2 weeks ago started to take its toll. Hackett and Bennett made
little impact on Harrops lead through the first lap of the 3 lap run,
but the great runners in the event such as Great Britains Michelle Dillon
and Japans Akiko Sekine and Kiyomi Niwata started to move through the
field, making up for many lost moments during the swim and bike.
But the surprise of the day came from Samantha Warriner of New Zealand. Due
to lack of funding after the Athens Olympic Games, Warriner was forced to return
to a full time teaching job and squeeze her training in between classes. Facing
a 45 second deficit after the swim, Warriner was lucky to catch a hard working
group on the bike that formed the second chase pack behind Hackett and Bennett.
She came off the bike with almost a 2 minute deficit on Harrop, but once on
her feet she quickly set her sights on the leader and by the end of the first
lap she found herself in 2nd place and in the hunt for her first podium finish,
let along a World Cup title.
On the second lap of the run Warriner caught Harrop and ran for home, occasionally
glancing nervously over her shoulder for the fast approaching Japanese duo of
Niwata and Sekine, as first Harrop and then Bennett and Hackett fell further
back in the field.
Warriner made a little history in Ishigaki by grabbing the first World Cup title,
not only for herself, but for any woman from New Zealand. Kiyomi Niwata was
2nd and Akiko Sekine was 3rd, much to the delight of the home-country fans.
Nicole Hackett posted her best World Cup performance since giving birth to her
first child last year, and Michelle Dillon rounded out the top 5.
Visit
the Ishigaki event page for full results and photo galleries.
Click here
for women’s live photo gallery
The mens event featured a great match-up between the Aussie and American
men, with World Cup leader Hunter Kemper coming head to head with the likes
of Greg Bennett, Simon Thompson, Courtney Atkinson, Craig Alexander and {exp:tag_this}Bryce
Quirk{/exp:tag_this}.
Kemper took an unprecedented lead through the first lap of the swim until his
team-mate Andy Potts overtook him and exited the swim with a 15 second lead
over Kemper, who was followed closely by Tsukasa Hirano of Japan, Australian
team-mates Chris Hill and David Dellow, Dirk Bockel of Luxembourg, and American
team-mates Joe Umphenour, Matt Reed and Doug Friman.
A huge pack of over 20 men emerged from the swim to bike transition and stayed
together until the 2nd lap when the newly implemented prime lap really shook
things up. Dirk Bockel out-sprinted Dan Alterman of Israel in a thrilling attack
and things were never the same after that. By the 4th lap David Dellow and Junichi
Yamamoto of Japan had broken away from the big pack as Seth Wealing of the USA
worked desperately hard at the front of the now disorganized big pack to create
some semblance of working order. By the bell lap, Switzerlands Didier
Broccard had pulled Chris Hill and Yuichi Hosoda up to Dellow and Yamamoto and
they stayed together through the final lap.
Broccard was the first off the bike and onto the run followed by Hill, Dellow,
Hosoda and Yunichi, as Matt Reed entered the transition all alone a few seconds
later. He was followed by Hunter Kemper at the front of the big pack.
Chris Hill moved to the front for the first 2 kilometres, but was quickly reeled
in by team-mates Atkinson, Thompson, Alexander and Quirk, along with Andrew
Johns of Great Britain and Hunter Kemper.
Broccard took a brief turn at the front, as did Matt Reed, but then a trio of
Atkinson, Kemper and Plata got together and emerged through the field to take
over the lead. They stayed together through the final lap of the run with Atkinson
dropping the American challengers in the final kilometers. Kemper retained his
role at the top of the World Cup standings by placing second, with Plata 3rd.
Aussie team-mates Craig Alexander and Simon Thompson were 4th and 5th.
The podium awards featured a photo moment with the Dr. Ohama, Mayor of Ishigaki
to commemorate the 10th staging of the Ishigaki World Cup and his slogan for
the World Cup, Go For World Peace.
An interesting side-note to the 10 years of World Cup racing on this idealistic
island in the South China sea is that of the 60 World Cup medal awarded over
the 10 years, Australian athletes have won an impressive 28 of them, and all
but 5 of the gold medals have gone to that country which has produced more World
Cup and World Champions than any other. Courtney Atkinson played a role in keeping
those odds alive today.
The events live coverage on www.triathon.org was enjoyed by thousands
around the world featuring ITUs voices of Triathlon, Jackie Gallagher
and Barrie Shepley.
Visit
the Ishigaki event page for full results and photo galleries.
Click
here for men’s live photo gallery