Brownlee, Jorgensen in Hamburg
Alistair Brownlee bolted away from his brother Jonathan and Vincent Luis with 500 meters to go to capture the 2014 ITU World Triathlon Series event in Hamburg. And as the women’s champion, Gwen Jorgensen now has grabbed 4 consecutive WTS events in 2014, and that makes her the first athlete to do so.
The weather was beautiful and the battle for the men's title was very exciting in this sprint format event and it ended up to be a great show for the massive amount of spectators in Hamburg, Germany. 65 men plunged into the water for the 750 meter swim and in that field were 19 of the top 20 men in the world. Henri Schoeman from South Africa set a wicked pace with Aurelien Raphael from France on his feet, and despite the short swim distance the young South African's speed caused trouble for some of the favorites. Schoeman exited the water in 8:41 with Raphael next 5 seconds later. Gomez had the fastest time of the favorites with a 8:52, and Alistair Brownlee came in at 8:56, but the younger Brownlee clocked in at 9:02, and that caused Alistair to wait for his brother.
The elder Brownlee then set a wicked pace on the bike that connected his group with the lead bunch that contained Gomez, Schoeman, Raphael, Aaron Royle, and a few others. And that meant that the front group was about 20 athlete strong with Joao Pereira and Joao Silva present, but no signs of Mario Mola and Richard Murray. Those 2 were in the next group which was about 20 seconds adrift and contained most of the other competitors. As the race progressed the advantage of the leaders grew, and despite fairly aggressive riding by the Brownlee brothers up front, they could not split up that group, or at the very least drop Gomez, Pereira, Silva and Vincent Luis.
Gomez ended up with a very sluggish transition, and word had it that he had miscalculated the laps, but it did not really matter. The WTS series leader quickly moved to the front with the Brownlee brothers and Luis, and in no time it became a 4 horse race. The Brownlee brothers and Luis however dropped Javier Gomez on the second lap of the run and initially it looked like it would be a Brownlee 1-2 punch, but Luis who is well known his sprinting prowess, charged past Jonathan Brownlee to capture the runner-up spot. Javier Gomez held on to fourth place.
The women actually started their sprint race before the men and it was Italian Alice Betto who took charge during the 750 meter swim in the Binnenalster, but her 9:42 effort meant that a very large group of women jumped on their bikes in very close succession.
It was mostly Brit Lucy Hall who set the pace of that lead bunch but it was not clear for whom and, but likely the group of fast runners riding along in that big front group did not care or worry about that. And Gwen Jorgensen was sitting nicely in that group too. When they reached T2 Jodie Stimpson and Kirsten Sweetland took off like rabbits, but Jorgensen was among the last ones of that front group to get on the run course.
Be it as it may, Jorgensen quickly moved past all the competitors ahead of her and was at the front of the race halfway into the 5km closing run. Emma Jackson had also worked her way to the front and dropped Andrea Hewitt and Annamaria Mazzetti who had been with her. Stimpson was next to fall off the pace and in no time Jorgensen had charged past Sweetland and Jackson to take the lead and run away to her 4th consecutive title.
"It was really hard out there. I didn't have a great position on the bike and the run was really hard too, those girls really made me work," said Jorgensen. "They were really coming for me at the end and I was really scared, I was tired, but I just have it everything I had."
Only Emma Moffatt has previously won 4 WTS events, but that was not in a row, so that fine effort added Gwen Jorgensen to the history books.
Emma Jackson and Kirsten Sweetland battled hard for the other 2 podium spots, and for a second it appeared that Sweetland had the edge, but in the end the Aussie managed to get to the line first, leaving Sweetland in 3rd place, but that was the first podium for the talented Canadian in just about 5 years.
2014 WTS Hamburg
Hamburg, Germany / July 12, 2014
750m swim / 20km bike / 5km run
Top men
1. Alistair Brownlee (GBR) 51:43
2. Vincent Luis (FRA) 51:45
3. Jonathan Brownlee (GBR) 51:48
4. Javier Gomez (ESP) 52:00
5. Dmitry Polyanskiy (RUS) 52:12
6. Joao Pereira (POR) 52:13
7. Dorian Connix (FRA) 52:14
8. Steffen Justus (GER) 52:21
9. Mario Mola (ESP) 52:23
10. Aurelien Raphael (FRA) 52:26
Top women
1. Gwen Jorgensen (USA) 56:54
2. Emma Jackson (AUS) 57:00
3. Kirsten Sweetland (CAN) 57:00
4. Andrea Hewitt (NZL) 57:11
5. Jodie Stimpson (GBR) 57:15
6. Annamaria Mazzetti (ITA) 57:25
7. Vicky Holland (GBR) 57:32
8. Barbara Riveros (CHI) 57:39
9. Aileen Reid (IRL) 57:42
10. Ashleigh Gentle (AUS) 57:45
