Wednesday morning on the San Antonio
coast saw the first off-road action of the 2023 World Triathlon Multisport
Championships Ibiza, and a beautiful, taxing cross duathlon course conquered in
some style by Belgium’s Sebastien Carabin and Netherland's Diede Diedericks
taking the biggest prize.
The opening 5.8km run looped through
streets and woods before the athletes were sent back out onto the gravel and
rocks, then a two-lap 20km bike into the hills combined tarmac climbs with
rock-strewn ascents and switchback descents between the pines, the course
ending with a 2.5km run to the tape along the San Antonio harbour.
Men's race
After that dry and dusty first lap
came to an end under the baking sun and picking through the rocks of the
coastline, it was Denmark’s Jens Emil Sloth Nielsen with Thibaut de Smet on his
shoulder, Sergio Correa Gonzalez and Sebastien Carabin tucked in behind.
Austria’s Andreas Silberbauer was ten
seconds back, Jens-Michael Gossauer five more, Italian Giuseppe Lamastra
already 80 seconds off the front but heading into transition with his preferred
test of two gruelling bike laps ahead.
Mountain bike specialist Carabin was
forced to stop and get a piece of tree out of his wheel leaving Sloth able to
pull clear on the route up into the forest and the Belgian found himself having
to push even more pace to try and make up ground.
The switchbacks through the pine
trees saw Carabin close the gap marginally and by the time they were out of the
trees and heading towards transition he had drawn level with Sloth at the
halfway point of the bike.
De Smet had dropped off and
Alessandro Saravelle was into third place with Correa, Austria’s Silberbauer
still right in contention, but up front it had become a battle between last
year’s silver medallist and Sloth, Saravelle looking to keep the marauding
Lamastra at bay.
Once he had forced a gap on the final
technical climb, the race was in Carabin’s hands. Suddenly there was 30 seconds
gap to Sloth and with the two evenly matched on foot, there was nothing the
Dane could do over the technical final run to haul it back.
Carabin came down the blue carpet to
take the tape by 23 seconds from Sloth, Saravalle crossing for bronze with a
minute to spare to Silberbauer, Giuseppe Lamastra rounding out the top five.
“It was very fast, the tempo was high
from the start and I just tried to keep in touch with the leader,” admitted
Carabin, “At 3km on the bike I got a piece of tree in my wheel and had to stop
and take it out so that lost me 25 seconds, and I had to push to come back, and
on the second lap just attack on every climb. On the technical part on lap two
I made a gap and then just kept pushing to transition. Coming out I was exhausted
but just wanted to keep the pace, I knew we were similar-strength runners, so I
had no time to waste. It is the technical mountain bike part where I think I’m
one of the best in the world and where I could push and make the gap.”
Check full results here
Women's race
From duathlon to middle distance and
now cross duathlon, Netherlands’ Diede Diedericks showed her remarkable
versatility once more on Wednesday afternoon in the sun of San Antonio to take
her first multisport world title in Ibiza.
It was a tough Cross Duathlon course
that awaited the athletes, a 5.8km opening run coming to an end along the
baking beachfront followed by two laps of a 10km mountain bike course that
threw a little bit of everything at its competitors, from ramps and chicanes to
rock-strewn climbs and snaking, pine-floored switchbacks, all wrapped up with a
shade-free 2.5km run to the tape.
It was Diederiks who wasted
absolutely no time establishing the pace at the front of the first segment
alongside Swiss Anna Zhender before pulling clear on her own over the more
technical section.
By the time they emerged back from
the headland at the end of the run course, the Dutch talent already had 35
seconds over Slovakia’s Kristina Lapinova now in second and 50 seconds to
Carina Wasle and Zehnder.
Spanish duo Enara Oronoz Mateo and
Eva Garcia Gonzalez were side-by-side a minute back, Norway’s winter specialist
Julie Meinicke leading the U23 field in the heat two minutes back as she worked
her way toward transition.
Onto the bike, there was no let up
from the Dutch maestro as she conquered the opening stage and then powered
through the rocky cliff-front section before heading back down towards
transition.
Zehnder was over two minutes back at
that stage but found herself a full four minutes adrift by the end of that
first lap, albeit secure in second with 90 seconds to Garcia in third. In fact,
90 seconds also separated third to sixth, so as Diedericks overcame a flat tyre
on the final descent and then hoovered up the final 2.5km to take an imperious
first world title, a battle was raging for the bronze medal.
With Zhender safely home for the
silver, it was to be Garcia who came round the final bend and hit the finish
chute with precious daylight over Lapinova to secure an excellent bronze, teammate
Oronoz completing the top five.
“I’ve only been mountain biking since
I was 27, but I love all this stuff,” said a thrilled Diedericks. “I stayed
with the Swiss athlete for the first half of the run but when it got a little
more technical I was able to get away and then I just really tried to hit the
watts on the bike. I got a flat on the second bike lap but it was downhill from
there so not too bad, I was able to use it on the corners a bit.”
Check full results here https://www.triathlon.org/results/result/2023_world_triathlon_multisport_championships_ibiza?mc_cid=4be19109b9&mc_eid=6139649918
ABOUT WORLD TRIATHLON
World Triathlon is the international
governing body for the Olympic and Paralympic sport of triathlon and all
related multisport disciplines around the world, including duathlon, aquathlon,
cross triathlon and winter triathlon. Triathlon made its Olympic debut in
Sydney 2000, with a third medal event, the Mixed Team Relay, added to the
programme at Tokyo 2020, while para triathlon was first added to the Paralympic
programme at Rio 2016. World Triathlon is proudly committed to the development
of the sport worldwide, with inclusion, equality, sustainability and
transparency at our core as we seek to help triathletes at all levels of the
sport to be extraordinary.
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