Junior Duathlon Results and Report

Excellent racing from all the juniors racing in the second TriPurbeck Duathlon of the winter. We moved the event to the Purbeck Sports Centre which gave us the ideal opportunity to test out the new mtb course which provided a technical challenge for the athletes. Add in the stiff northerly wind and it was about as tough as it gets for  a junior event. Apparently unperturbed, the tristart racers were off first. After a brief demonstration of why it’s important to know your left from right the athletes tagged on to the lead bike and hared round the first 400m run. George Mahon stamped his authority on the event from the start and never looked like he could be overtaken, winning the boys event in style. Fin Wilde produced a solid performance from start to finish to come in second and Max Burnet kept his concentration to post the second fastest bike split in third place. A special mention for Fin Bungay who’s parents neglected to put his helmet in transition so he had to run to the van to get it in T1 – still came in fourth posting the fastest second run split of the day – legendary – wonder who his parents are………

Charlotte Lang bossed the tristart girls race with Annabel Cobb and excellent 2nd in her first race and the diminutive figure of underage Emma Brown taking third…….. Dave be afraid……

Tristar 1 saw some more close racing with Max Bungay leading out the first run followed closely by Heidi Taylor – two athletes with multiple race wins under their belts. Max, stepping up up in age group for the first time, wasn’t able to stay with Josh Lang who was riding his cross bike very strongly, and Josh came through to win by some distance. No stopping Heidi though who came in second overall and won the girls race. Max took second in the boys with Isaac Pinch coming through on the bike to grab 3rd. Ellie Stannard also had a great bike to comfortably take 2nd place and Agnes Brook used her customary bike skills to make her way up to 3rd.

The final race of the day was an amalgamation of  TS2 and TS3 and a cat and mouse first run resulted in 3 athletes entering T1 together with Callum McDermott holding a slight lead over Lola Brown and Will Baker. But Will went to work on the bike to move quickly away from the field and win the TS2 race. Lily Burnet knew her faster biking skills would need to give her lead on the bike over Lola of she was to win. She caught and overtook Lola half way through the bike but Lola gritted her teeth and hung in, staying close enough to come through and win the TS3 girls race on the second run. Callum took second in the TS2 boys race with Dan Goss 3rd. Annie Bungay put in a consistent performance as the only TS2 girl  and took the last prize of the day.

Many thanks to all the marshalls (special mention for Guy and Mark who make it possible)and Planet X for providing the prizes

- see you next time at the Junior Tri at Milton Abbey on May 17th.

  Will Baker demonstrates how to get on a bike!