Flora Duffy and Dorian Coninx Command Wins at Montreal World Triathlon Championships

Bermuda’s Flora Duffy and Dorian Coninx of France dominated the new super-sprint eliminator format to command wins and take Gold in the Montreal World Triathlon Championships. 

The Groupe Copley World Triathlon Championship Series took to the streets in the Canadian city, of Montreal on Saturday, as 30 women and 30 men athletes took to the start line for the elimination final to battle it out for Gold. 

In an intense new race format, the eliminator final took place over three more super-sprints consisting of: 300m swim, 7.2km bike, 2km run in which 10 athletes secured automatic progression into today’s final.

As 30 athletes in each of the gender races lined up for the first race. the last ten across the line were eliminated. The second race saw 20 athletes in each race where at the end the final ten were also eliminated. The third and final race of the championship saw the remaining 10 athletes in each gender race to battle it out for gold in a dramatic finale. 

Women Eliminator Final 

Into the final of the super-sprint eliminator stacked with 10 world class triathletes that included race Olympic Gold Medalist Flora Duffy, USA’s fourth, sixth and seventh-ranked athletes of Taylor Spivey, Katie Zaferes and Taylor Knibb, the British duo of Non Stanford and Sophie Coldwell with remaining four slots made up of Germany’s Laura Lindermann, Italy’s Verena Steinhauser, France’s Leonie Periault  and New Zealand Kiwi Nicole Van Der Kaay 

The final began at 02:56 local time and exiting the water first to complete the 300-metre swim was GB’s Sophie Coldwell just two seconds ahead Duffy, Spivy and Lindermann with the rest of the field a further 4 seconds behind. 

Out of T1 and Duffy along with Spivey tried to make a break-away but the bike-beast inside of USA’s Taylor Knibb’s was having none of it as she powered her way to the front which quickly brought all the other athletes into contention and a pack was formed.  

As they cycled the 7.2 km through the streest of the historic capital city of Quebec which featured several highly technical turns, the pack could not hold on as Knibbs, Duffy and Spivey broke away to make a large gap from the chasers.  

As the three of them entered T2 and headed out onto the run with a clear advantage and ,for all intent and purposes, it was just a question of who out of these three would take Gold.    

Despite Zaferes, heading the chasing pack, efforts to close the deficit was all in vain as Spivey and Knibb’s pushed the pace with Duffy just biding her time to make the move. And make the move she did as she put all her running skill and experience to good use to command the run coming into the final lap. 

It was Duffy who continued to catapult her way forward to run through and claim first place, seven second ahead of fearless Knibb’s and Spivey taking a satisfying third spot given her disappointment of being left out of the US Olympics team. 

It was a joy to watch how Flora Duffy knew how to manage the new format of the three super-sprint event and how she maintained her advantage in the final race to seal the World Series victory.  

 The icing on the cake for Duffy was she won in the fastest time of all the three super- sprint races in a time of 00:23:07 followed by Taylor Knibb, (00: 23: 14) and Taylor Spivy (00: 23: 24) occupying the third final position.  

Great Britain’s hopefuls Sophie Coldwell and Non Stanford who both reached the final put in stellar performances claiming 7^th and 10^th respectively out of the events original starting field of 41 women athletes. Sian Rainsley just missed out on a final 10 spot in the final coming 13th overall and Olivia Mathias rounding off in 29th place.

Womens Classification 

Pos	First Name	Last Name	Country	Time
1	Flora	Duffy	BER	00:23:07
2	Taylor	Knibb	USA	00:23:14
3	Taylor	Spivey	USA	00:23:24
4	Katie	Zaferes	USA	00:23:33
5	Leonie	Periault	FRA	00:23:37
6	Laura	Lindemann	GER	00:23:39
7	Sophie	Coldwell	GBR	00:23:56
8	Verena	Steinhauser	ITA	00:24:00
9	Nicole	Van Der Kaay	NZL	00:24:11
10	Non	Stanford	GBR	00:24:28

Men’s Eliminator Final 

Into the final of the men’s super-sprint race stacked with 10 world class triathletes that included the French trio of 2 x World Champion Vincent Luis, Dorian Coninx and Leo Bergere, USA Olympic Team Relay silver medalist Kevin McDowell and and Seth Rider first repechage athlete to make a final. Also racing were Belgian Marten Van Riel, Spaniard Antonio Serrat Seoane and from down under two Kiwi’s, Olympic Bronze medalist Hayden Wilde and Tayler Reid with Aussie Jacob Birtwhistle making up the field.

The men’s final turned into more tactical and slower race with little headway being made by any of the athletes in the first two discipline of the swim and bike which left the winner to be chosen from the athlete who had the running legs.   

It was 2 x World Champion Frenchman Vincent Luis who did most of the front-running for the first two legs being first to exit the swim in a time of 00:03:40 followed by the Kiwi Tayler Reid and American Seth Rider. Fourteen seconds was the gap between first and last swimmer Olympic Bronze medalist Hayden Wilde.  

Luis headed out of T2 which a sizeable gap but the chasing pack were all bunched together which brought them all back into contention. There was no manoeuvring by any of the athletes to make a break-away. And that’s the way it stayed as the bike leg transformed into the pace of a training session as each of the athletes played cat and mouse tactics.  

(To give you an idea how slow the men’s bike leg was: in the women’s race all three podium winners were faster than the men with USA Taylor Knibb a massive 28 seconds quicker on the bike than the winner in the men’s race) 

It was USA Seth Rider one of the slower runners in the field who made a late burst to come into T2 first but all the riders were within 5 seconds of each other.  

Out onto the run and it was a tussle between the French trio of Coinix, Luis and Bergere with Belgian Marten Van Riel and Spaniard Antonio Serrat Seoane in the mix. But it was to be a French Master Running Class as the French trio took first, second and third spots.  

At the finishing tape it was Dorian Coninx who took the win in a time of 00:22:08, holding off the challenge by Vincent Luis by one second (00:22:08) and a further three seconds ahead of third placed Leo Bergere (00:22:08:11). 

Mens Classification 

Pos	First Name	Last Name	Country	Time
1	Dorian	Coninx	FRA	00:22:08
2	Vincent	Luis	FRA	00:22:09
3	Léo	Bergere	FRA	00:22:11
4	Marten	Van Riel	BEL	00:22:16
5	Antonio	Serrat Seoane	ESP	00:22:18
6	Hayden	Wilde	NZL	00:22:24
7	Jacob	Birtwhistle	AUS	00:22:31
8	Tayler	Reid	NZL	00:22:41
9	Seth	Rider	USA	00:22:57
DNF	Kevin	McDowell	USA	DNF

Full Results can be found here: