Clark on a sugar high after win
Sam Clark has joined elite company after storming home and winning his third consecutive Coast to Coast title.
‘‘This is the best feeling,’’ the Whakatane athlete told the crowd at the finish line in New Brighton. ‘‘My body hurts from head to toe but I’m here and I’ve made it three, so hell yeah.’’
Clark completed the taxing 243km race across the South Island 11hr 14min 33sec after starting at Kumara Beach on the West Coast at 6am yesterday. Clark joins Steve Gurney (nine), Richard Ussher (five), Gordon Walker (three), Braden Currie (three) and John Jacoby (three) with at least three titles to their name.
He crossed the line just under half an hour clear of second-placed Alex Hunt (Australia), not that Clark told himself it was over until he had stopped the clock.
‘‘It ain’t over until it’s over, anything can happen. Some mumpty could open their car door on you. This is a highly complex race and all
the stars have to be in line for anybody to get from one side of the country to the other, let alone to win the race,’’ Clark said.
After telling Stuff before the race he’d consume more than a kilogram of sugar during the day, Clark devoured 1.2kg of raw sugar and his ‘‘mission for the day was to basically out-eat’’ his competition. But as jubilant as he was after getting the job done, Clark wasn’t about to extend the longest day much longer.
‘‘Probably an early night, I can’t see myself being too far out of bed. I’m absolutely wrecked,’’ Clark said when asked how he’d celebrate.
Clark’s winning time was more than 10min slower than his winning time last year, when he pulled off a remarkable comeback to beat Braden Currie, but it didn’t take any gloss off the result. ‘‘They call this the longest day for a reason, and what a long day it is. I was up before 4am this morning, eating breakfast and stretching and all that sort of garbage, and here I am now at a quarter past five on the east coast. Man, there’s no better feeling in the world. This is the greatest race.
‘‘I had a manic chase last year, I was running from myself this time around. This feeling is second to none, there’s no feeling like it.’’
After a tight 30.5km mountain run through Goat Pass, which Clark finished just 2min ahead of Gore’s Hamish Elliott, he hit the water for the 70km kayak on the Waimakariri River and promptly started pulling away from the rest of the field.
By the halfway mark of the kayak, Elliott had faded and Hunt had a 14 minute lead over Hunt, before extending the gap to 18 minutes at the start of the final leg – the 69.5km cycle across the Canterbury Plains.
Australian James Pretto, who lost crucial time on the opening 55km cycle leg after dropping a chain, rebounded to finish third. In the twoday races, Oliver Thompson (12hr 21min 28sec) and Jennifer Walker (13hr 12min 01sec) won the men’s and women’s races.
Clark devoured 1.2kg of raw sugar and his ‘‘mission for the day was to basically out-eat’’ his competition.