In the BVI Triathlon’s National Sprint Champs held on Saturday, Richard Morgan, 2012 national champion, regained his men’s title. Sue Tucker became the Ladies champion, setting a new course record, which was also broken by the second and third place ladies too.
Morgan clocked a time of 1 hour, 16 minutes and 16 seconds, taking the title from last year’s winner Russel Crumpler. Crumpler didn’t defend his title but Morgan’s time was just under three and half minutes faster than Crumpler’s 2013 winning time and just under two minutes faster than his 2012 time. Guy Williamson was a scant 1 minute and 2 seconds behind Morgan for second place and Adrian Dale was third.
Sue Tucker with a finish time of 1 hour, 19 minutes and 13 seconds shattered the freshly minted 2013 ladies record set by Kat Crumpler last year. She took a considerable 3 minutes and 52 seconds off the record; Crumpler had taken almost three minutes off the record last year. Second placer Tash Ruschenski and third placer Gillian Howe also broke the 2013 record. The ladies field is getting faster and faster; there is now only 5 minutes and 37 seconds between the men’s and ladies’ records. The ladies have taken almost 8 minutes off their record since 2011.
Chris Ghiorse remains the course record holder with a time of 1:13:36 set in 2011.
Team Commonwealth won the team event with a time of 1 hour, 11 minutes and 32 seconds.
The event was held at Sandy Ground boatyard, Soper’s Hole. The event comprised a 750-metre swim, 20-kilometre bike ride and a five-kilometre run.
Next event on the BVI Triathlon Federation calendar is the Peter Island Athlon on June 14, details will be published shortly.
