Riyadh Triathletes test mettle in Abu Dhabi Int’l Triathlon

Last week Riyadh Triathletes made their way to Abu Dhabi to take part in their first main event of the year the Abu Dhabi International Triathlon.
With them they got the new trisuits for the 2013 season showing the club logos and their sponsors namely Carrefour Le Mall and 2XU compression. A nice surprise reached the athletes just before the start when Power Horse announced that the energy drink will support the club as well in the race and the season besides Nestle Pure Water, Riyadh Palace Hotel and Wolfi’s Bike Shop.
Encouraged by so much attention the participants took on the challenge to face UK’s Alistair Brownlee in the short course by swimming 1,5 km, racing 100km on the bike followed by a 10km run. But the 2012 Olympic gold medal winner showed that he was racing in a class of his own and crushed even the course record with his time of 3 hours 20 minutes and 18 seconds.
Riyadh Triathletes closest runner up was Kristoffer Ahlin who finished the distance in 4:09:47 hours. Antonio Castellanos finished his race with an amazing run of 40:23 minutes to get second place of the club internal competition before local athlete Nasser Mutarrid finished close to him in 4:17:19 hours. Fastest woman on the course from Riyadh was Jana Jaruskova who finished with her new personal record of 5:00:54 hours.
Only four athletes withstood the opportunity to race against the Olympic Star and preferred to face head on the 200km bike course along the corniche all the way to the F1 Yas Marina circuit where they had to cycle 3 loops after the 3km swim before finishing the race with a 20km run.
The winner out of the professional field Frederick van Lierde picked already one of the checks for $ 50,000 after finishing in 6:41:02 hours as well as new woman champion Melissa Hauschildt who finished in 7:20:29 hours while Riyadh Athletes Gaeton Contrino, Paul McParland, Sebastien Jaulent and Gerd Muetze were still on the course. The fastest of them was n Contrino in 8:48:29 while Gerd Muetze finished in 9:24:50 on his long distance debut. Senior athlete Paul McParland accomplished the course as third in 10:25:39 hours.
All Riyadh Triathletes were happy about their results in the event and are looking forward to start their season on April 11. New athletes are welcome and can register on www.riyadhtriathletes.com for the races.