After winning the Junior Elite Men’s World Triathlon title last year in London, Frenchman Dorian Coninx graduated to win the Under 23 Men’s gold this year at the Grand Final World Championship in Edmonton.

“It’s crazy – I would like to be the same as him [Junior, Under 23 and elite World Champion Alistair Brownlee] but it will be hard,” said Coninx about his ambitious quest that is now two-thirds true. “It was a good weekend for France, good for good new French athletes.”

Coninx was referring to fellow French triathlete Raphael Montoya’s gold at the Junior Elite men’s race and Cassandre Beaugrand’s silver and Audrey Merle’s bronze in the Junior Elite Women's race on Friday.

Coninx’s road to the gold was at least as tough as Montoya’s test. He swam 17:37 which brought him out of Lake Hawrelak in 5th place, just six seconds back of swim leader Seunghun Seo of Korea, 5 seconds back of Alex LePage of Canada, 3 seconds back of Ben Kanute of the U.S. and a few seconds ahead of serious rivals Marc Austin and Gordon Benson of the UK.

Despite multiple attempts to break away, a clot of 25 riders stuck together on the 43k bike leg, leaving the run to decide the medals. So, after the wet swim-bike procession, Coninx sped out of T2 first, with Austin, Benson and Wian Sullwald of South Africa hot on his heels with the rest of the field in their dust.

The leading quartet ran elbow to elbow for three laps before Coninx and Austin found another gear and fought until Coninx made the decisive move, crossing the line after a 31:19 run in an overall time of 1:53:06 which gave him a 14 seconds margin of victory on Austin and 24 seconds on 3rd place finisher Benson.

Ben Kanute of the U.S. combined a 17:34 swim, 1:02:49 bike leg and 6th best 32:11 run to finish in 6th place, 55 seconds back of the winner.

Under 23 Men World Triathlon Grand Final
Edmonton, Canada
August 30, 2014
S 1.5k / b 43k / R 10k

Results

Under 23 Men

1. Dorian Coninx (FRA) 1:53:06
2. Marc Austin (GBR) 1:53:20
3. Gordon Benson (GBR) 1:53:30
4. Simon Vlain (FRA) 1:53:46
5. Martin Van Riel (BEL) 1:53:56
6. Ben Kanute (USA) 1:54:01
26. Hunter Lussi (USA) 1:57:14