Canadians Win Silver and Bronze at ITU Dallas Continental Cup

Canada’s next generation of Olympic triathletes celebrated a double medal day at a Continental Cup race in Dallas, Texas on Saturday.

Joanna Brown, of Carp, Ont. ran through the blistering heat to win the silver medal with a time of 2:10:50, while Quebec’s Manon Letourneau captured the bronze at 2:13:00 behind U.S.A. Olympian, Laura Bennett who won the race just weeks after qualifying for the 2012 Games.

“I love racing in the heat so I think it played to my advantage today,” said the 19-year-old Brown, who won a bronze medal at the Junior World Championships two years ago in Budapest, Hungary. ” I played things smart today. You have to be intelligent in the heat and I was all day.”

Brown got out of the water after the 1.5 kilometre swim in the second chase pack where she worked well with a  number of Canadians to close the gap on the chase pack on the third lap of the flat 40-kilometre bike course, setting herself up for a podium charge on the 10-kilometre run.

“Laura pretty much controlled the front for the whole race, but I ran behind her early and gave her a good push,” said Brown, who was within 15 seconds of Bennett for the first7.5-kilometres of the run course. “I learned today I can’t get caught up in the what the girls I’m competing against have done and react only to how the race is playing out.”

Bennett, who finished fourth at the 2008 Olympic Summer Games, clocked a winning time of 2:10:22. Calgary’s Alexandra Coates also threatened the podium, finishing fourth in 2:14:40.

Meanwhile, Alexander Hinton of Kingston, Ont., narrowly missed the podium in the men’s race. The 21-year-old Hinton battled the blistering heat and sunny conditions to clock a fourth-place time of 1:59:37.

American Lukes Verzbicas, who won the 2011 Junior World Championships, finished on top in Dallas after clocking-in at 1:57:56. Another American Olympians, Mauel Huerta, grabbed the silver medal with a time of 1:58:59, while Joe Maloy completed the American sweep on the men’s side of the draw with a time of 1:59:10.

For a complete list of results, including Canadian results, please visit www.triathlon.org