Jonny Brownlee retains ITU Sprint world title
Jonny Brownlee retains sprint world title in Switzerland
Jonathan Brownlee pulled off a spectacular victory at the ITU Sprint World Championships in Lausanne, finishing ahead of Javier Gomez and his brother Alistair. Jonathan retained the title he won last year, but this time against one of the strongest sprint triathlon fields ever assembled.
Jonathan and Alistair Brownlee both had excellent swims, exiting in the first group before forming a strong breakaway with Gomez and Alexander Brukhankov on the bike. Tim Don managed to ride up to the leaders on the hilly course, but Jonathan had the better positioning coming out of the second transition.
Having predicted that a 14min30second 5km run would be needed in order to win this race, Jonathan delivered a blistering 14:24 run split. He exchanged the lead with Javier Gomez but took to the front with 300m to go and crossed the line as a convincing winner.
He said: “It’s the best sprint field ever I think. I’m really pleased.”
This is the first time that Jonathan has won a Dextro Energy Triathlon ITU World Championship Series race, and the first time he’s beaten his older brother in a close race. However, he was quick to play down the win.
He said: “It’s a sprint race so it’s a different sport really, it’s so much faster. I’ve still not beaten him [Alistair] properly but it’s nice to beat him this time.”
Alistair claimed bronze, fighting back strongly after a difficult start. Third place was enough to take him to the top of the world rankings and set up an exciting Grand Final where the brothers will start as number one and number two in the world.
Alistair said: “I got seriously blocked in with people getting in my way for the first 500m [of the run] and then I ran up to Jonny, but I knew I didn’t have the legs to be honest. I thought right, what do I have to do to take that third place and kicked on. I’m pleased for Jonny.”
Tim Don finished 12th and world junior silver medallist, Tom Bishop finished an excellent 23rd in his first Series race and Todd Leckie was 31st.
Manisha
