Bajan sportspersons continue to put the island on the international stage as Matthew Wright won the Elite Grand Prix Triathlon (Esprit de Montreal) contested on Saturday September 9, 2017. Matthew won in a time of 57mins 25.2 secs over Canadian Francis Lefebvre who was 12 secs behind.
Matthew was off to a great start in 2017 where he had three top 10 ITU Continental finishes and then broke his toe while racing the Bridgetown CAMTRI Sprint Triathlon American Cup and Caribbean and Central American Championship, whilst still placing 8th. This is an important victory for Matthew in a long recovery from setback injuries over the past two years but a morale boosting performance as he, and fellow world triathlete Jason Wilson, prepare for next year’s Commonwealth Games & the Central American & Caribbean Games. Matthew is currently ranked 11th in the ITU Americas Continental rankings.
When asked to describe his performance Matthew commented, “I had a great swim, after about 200m I moved up to 2nd, where I remained for the rest of the 750m swim. I was 1st out onto the bike with about a 5-10 second gap, but with 4 guys chasing me down, I decided to ease up and let them catch me. Two others caught us about 3km in, and the group of 7 of us worked well together for the remainder of the 4 lap 20km ride to head into T2 with around a 35 second lead on the chasers. It was a super-fast bike course as we rode on the F1 race track. Onto the run, we ran as a group for about 600m, after that I picked up the pace and managed to put daylight between me and the other guys. My training partner Francis Lefebvre was only about 20 metres behind me after the 1st of 2 laps, so I had to keep the pace honest and halfway through the second lap I managed to open up the gap. I got a bad right side cramp with about 800m to go, but luckily I had a big enough gap that I could afford to run easier into the finish. All in all it was a really good race, I never had to extend myself too much throughout the race, and always felt in control. I am very happy to get my 1st win (and podium) for the season!”
Meanwhile, plans are progressing smoothly for the staging of the 1st CARIFTA Triathlon & Aquathlon Championships to be held in Barbados over the weekend of October 7-8, and 27th Barbados National Triathlon on October 15th. Interested participants should visit the triathlon website at http://www.triathlonbarbados.com/ or the BFIT Barbados Triathlon Facebook page.
BFIT is the governing federation for triathlon and triathletes in Barbados. BFIT sanctions and organizes multi-sport events, which include Triathlon, Duathlon and Aquathlon. For more information on future events and the sport of triathlon contact triathlonbarbados@gmail.com.
