Beth buzzing after battling her way to bronze

BEAMING from ear to ear as she jogged to the finishing line, Beth Potter picked up Scotland’s first medal of Birmingham’s Commonwealth Games with bronze in the women’s triathlon. ‘I am buzzing,’ she said. ‘This has been the aim of the season for me and I’m just happy to get Scotland a medal.’ It took the two best female triathletes in the world to edge out Potter. Just as they did at last summer’s Tokyo Olympics, Flora Duffy of Bermuda and England’s Georgia Taylor-Brown won gold and silver respectively. But 30-year-old Glaswegian Potter is now a force to be reckoned with, too — and proved that to anyone within British Triathlon, who still may feel she is too old or too fragile to make the grade. With arguably her best swim since switching from athletics five years ago, Potter burst into the lead in Sutton Park and threatened to break the established order. But she suffered on the bike and Duffy seized control to defend her title in 55min, 25 secs. Taylor-Brown was unable to stop her taking gold. Potter was 40 seconds behind her British rival but 20 clear of another Englishwoman, Sophie Coldwell, with Scottish prospect Sophia Green 17th. This was the pay-off for Potter’s self-belief and hard work to get her swimming and cycling up to scratch. ‘I’ve not been doing a lot of running,’ she admitted. ‘I have been working on my swim-bike this year and it is paying off. I put a lot of work in this winter and I’m reaping the rewards.’ Her stats on Strava are off the charts — 120km tours of Yorkshire on two wheels. Loops of the local lake. And then back to the familiar terrain of running that saw the Rio 2016 Olympic finalist set an unofficial world record over 5km on the roads last year. ‘It may take another year to be really good off the bike,’ she added. ‘I want to be top three and that puts you up with the best in the world. I’m not quite there with that yet. But I’ve been getting better with every race.’ Alex Yee got the hosts off to a perfect start with gold in the men’s triathlon but the Olympic silver medallist could yet share victory with runner-up Hayden Wilde. Yee took advantage of a penalty to chase down his challenger to win in 50:34. He said: ‘I’m sorry Hayden got his penalty but to have that finish moment is special. I looked at the penalty board and saw his number.’ But the New Zealander confirmed he will lodge a protest for the 10-second stop handed out for unclipping his helmet prematurely at the end of the cycle leg. Australian pair Matthew Hauser and Jacob Birtwhistle were third and fourth, with Scotland’s Grant Sheldon in fifth place.