Elite Female Triathlete of the Year
We’re getting used to seeing WJoanna Brown dominate the elite side of the sport and in 2018 she excelled once again. It was a self-admitted “up and down” season for the 26-year-old from Carp, Ont., but one which included a bronze medal at the Commonwealth Games and another top-five World Triathlon Series finish when she took fourth in Montreal.
Things got off to a crazy start for Brown when she crashed at the first WTS race of the season in Abu Dhabi and fractured her shoulder. Brown
is hardly new to adversity, though. A few years ago she was ready to call it a career after a string of injuries, but she hung on and enjoyed a breakthrough year in 2017, earning TMC’s triathlete of the year honours in the process. With a month to go before the Commonwealth Games, she buckled down and somehow managed to rehab the shoulder to the point where she could compete.
All of which made that bronze medal in Australia, which was Canada’s first medal of the Games, even more satisfying. Brown used the day’s fastest 5-km effort to nail down the final spot on the podium and become only the fourth Canadian to earn a medal at the Commonwealths.
Unfortunately, Brown endured more bad luck through many more of the WTS series races, including getting caught behind a crash in Hamburg. There was the highlight in Montreal, but then the bad luck returned for the Grand Final.
“The season has been extremely difficult and very frustrating,” Brown said after a flat tire derailed her day at Australia’s Gold Coast. “I have had some unfortunate circumstances in races, but I have been in the lead group in almost every World Triathlon Series this year and I have to be proud of that. I will only be back stronger for the 2019 season.”
Some impressive results in the Super League Series saw her end up seventh in the standings with one more championship event to go early in 2019, too.
Which is even more evidence of just how up and down Joanna Brown’s 2018 ended up. It’s a good sign, though, when even a year like that net’s you a triathlete of the year award.