Kiwi men eye 3 spots for London
New Zealand’s chances of having three competitors in the men’s triathlon at the London Olympics are all but guaranteed after a strong performance in San Diego yesterday.
The New Zealand men enjoyed one of their most successful ITU World Triathlon Series events, with three athletes finishing in the top 10 to cement their overall ranking inside the top eight countries in the world and virtually secure three starting spots at London 2012.
Ryan Sissons backed up his runner-up finish at the Huatulco World Cup last week with a superb sixth place and was closely followed by Bevan Docherty (eighth) and Kris Gemmell (10th). All three are showing good form in their lead-up to London.
London reserve Clark Ellice also raced strongly in a compressed field, finishing just 28 seconds behind Gemmell in 21st place, while Tony Dodds came home 49th.
The results leave New Zealand in a strong position of third place on the Olympic Nations rankings behind Germany and Great Britain with just Madrid to come before the top eight nations each secure their three starting positions for London.
While the calculations can be complicated and nothing is confirmed until the end of this month, it appears unlikely that the chasing pack can overtake New Zealand, and even more sure that New Zealand will not drop out of the eight completely.
The top eight is rounded out by France, Spain, Russia, Australia, Canada and Portugal.
Great Britain’s Jonathan Brownlee kicked off his Olympic season with a dominant performance in San Diego, winning his second series title ahead of Switzerland’s Sven Riederer and South Africa’s Richard Murray.
In the race that had a huge impact on the Olympic picture, Brownlee was part of a small break at the start of the bike. However, that didn’t last long as a huge pack of over 50 athletes hit T2 together.
From there it came down to the run, and Brownlee and Murray charged to the front on the first lap. They went toe to toe for almost half of the 10km run, before Brownlee laid down the trademark family kick and went on to win in 1hr 48m 47s, his first race in almost seven months.
New Zealand has also strengthened its hold on a top eight place in the Olympic women’s rankings despite Debbie Tanner being brought down in a crash in the women’s race on Saturday.
The New Zealanders went to San Diego looking to strengthen their position with time running out to the cut-off at the end of this month.
Nicky Samuels raced against the odds for a hard-earned 39th placing, coming just two weeks after enduring emergency surgery to remove her appendix while Tanner’s race was undone by a crash immediately in front of her on lap one of the bike leg.