After a tough start to the season that saw her get COVID twice, not to mention having her bike not arrive for Ironman 70.3 Mont-Tremblant, Flora Duffy showed that she’s back in winning form with a huge win at today’s Commonwealth Games triathlon event, successfully defending her title over Britain’s Georgia Taylor-Brown and Scotland’s Beth Potter.
Canada’s Emy Legault continued her dream season, managing to make the lead pack before finding herself like all but one other in the field – incapable of keeping up with Duffy when she decided it was time to pull clear. Only Taylor-Brown was able to join in for that breakaway. In the end there was no touching Duffy – as you’ll see in this recap:
They’re off. With a water temperature of 19.1 degrees Celsius, the field was all in wetsuits.After not racing since last year’s Olympics, Amelie Kretz made a solid return to racing.So much for her being a runner! Beth Potter, who represented Great Britain at the 2016 Olympics in the 10,000 m led the way out of the waterAt about 8 km into the 20 km ride Flora Duffy decided it was time to make a break – only Taylor-Brown could go with herThat left Legault in a group with Britain’s Sophie Coldwell and Scotland’s Beth PotterLegault was still with the first chase group as she hit T2 …But Kretz, Canadian Dominika Jamnicky and the rest of the second chase group weren’t far behindDuffy was first out of T2 and never looked back …Taylor-Brown, one of the best runners in the sport, wasn’t able to stay close to DuffyLegault managed to stay clear of the second chase group through the first loop of the run, but wasn’t able to hang on for a top-5 finishJamnicky and Kretz pushed each other on the runCommonwealth Gold in 2018. Olympic gold in 2021. Commonwealth gold again in 2022. Bermuda will be thrilled …The smile says it allTaylor-Brown would take silver, just as she did in Tokyo last yearPotter would round out the podiumLegault continued her amazing season with a 10th-place finishJamnicky would move up a spot from her 2018 finish to take 13thExhausted, but happy
Photo by:
Kevin Mackinnon
