Mario Mola showed that Moolalaba was no fluke and beat fellow-Spaniard Javier Gomez to the line at the New Plymouth ITU World Cup race. Katie Hursey also had done well at the season-opening Mooloolaba World Cup but now finished on the very top of the podium. Her excellent performance in both of these races showed that Gwen Jorgensen is not the only title threat from the USA these days.
American Tommy Zafares led the deep men's field out of the water after the opening 750 meter swim. But that sprint distance swim was not enough to spread out the field.
A group of about 35 men raced through the streets of New Plymouth and pretty much all of those who had ambitions for the title were represented in the group.
Once on the run Gomez moved to the front, but Mola was soon after the man in charge of the pace. As the two Spaniards approached the finish Mola managed to get away from Gomez and grabbed his second World Cup win in as many attempts this year.
"It was perfect for me, I felt good on the swim and then I knew I had to be careful on the bike because there are a lot of guys racing here and the course was a bit tricky and a lot of corners. But I did what I was supposed to do, what I had in my mind before the race. Then on the 5kms of the run, I was lucky to have the win. Congratulations to Javi and Joao for the race, I have a lot of respect for Javi so I feel very happy to been able to have this race. I’m also really happy to have raced with or against Javi, that’s always great," said Mola.
Caroline Routier was first out of the water in the women's race and she led a group of 15 onto the bikes.
The hard pace of Kate McIlroy however cause a couple athletes to drop from that front group and prevented the chasers from joining the leading bunch. Nicky Samuels, Katie Hursey, Helen Jenkins, Jodie Stimpson, Andrea Hewitt, Sarah Groff, Kirsten Sweetland and Paula Findlay were in that front group that reached the bike-run transition with a 40 second advantage over the next group.
Hursey looked strong on the run and pulled away from the other competitors during the 5k run. When it was all said and done Hursey claimed her 3rd World Cup title in her young career, and Hewitt charged past Stimpson to take the runner-up spot.
"Last year was my first draft legal race, I did San Diego the WTS race as my third one, and all these girls were the ones I looked up too that I wanted to be like. For me to be mixing it in with them now that's one of the goals that I had and only in the second year. So I'm really excited about that," said Hursey.
Hewitt was happy about her performance and said, "That was a huge step up from last week. I think it was good to have the hit out in Australia because here was just so hard but it was all good, second place is great. Last year Jodie was stronger than me and was on the podium a lot last year so for me to be running comfortably with her and out sprint her it is a nice feeling."
2014 New Plymouth ITU Triathlon World Cup
New Plymouth, NZL / March 23, 2014
.75k swim / 20k bike / 5k run
Elite Men
1. Mario Mola (ESP) 52:30
2. Javier Gomez (ESP) 52:33
3. Joao Silva (POR) 52:56
4. Fernando Alarza (ESP) 53:03
5. Brendan Sexton (AUS) 53:08
6. Ryan Sissons (NZL) 53:10
7. David Hauss (FRA) 53:11
8. Kyle Jones (CAN) 53:13
9. Dan Wilson (AUS) 53:22
10. Laurent Vidal (FRA) 53:26
Elite Women
1. Katie Hursey (USA) 57:27
2. Andrea Hewitt (NZL) 57:38
3. Jodie Stimpson (GBR) 57:39
4. Helen Jenkins (GBR) 57:54
5. Kirsten Sweetland (CAN) 58:02
6. Nicky Samuels (NZL) 58:17
7. Sarah Groff (USA) 58:33
8. Pamela Oliveira (BRA) 58:40
9. Paula Findlay (CAN) 58:44
10. Yuka Sato (JPN) 58:55
