A third Asia Cup in China in the space of two months took place today. In Lianyungang, as had been the case with the races in Dexing and Taizhou earlier in the year, the athletes took on the Olympic distance.
The men’s winner from Taizhou, Jumpei Furuya, started however none of the women’s medallists appeared this time round. As a result, whereas the men’s race had an obvious pre-race favourite, the women’s event was a little more open.
Men’s race
Qili Bai of China led the way in the water as he clocked a split of 20:22 for the 1500m. His compatriot, Chi Zhang, was on his feet. Furuya and Oscar Dart exited together, a little over 10 seconds down on Bai.
After medals from his last two international outings, Dart was the most obvious challenger to Furuya and marked him closely through the opening kilometres on the bike.
A front pack of over ten men came together on the bike. Among them were Tamás Tóth and Oscar Coggins, both of whom took long turns on the front in the opening laps. With a slightly long course awaiting the athletes – the bike measured 44km in total – an element of energy conservation had to be factored into the race.
As such, while Furuya looked untroubled he did not drop the hammer in the way he had earlier in the season. Dart and Coggins also made sure to stay tucked in on his wheel in case of any surge in pace.
In front of home support, several members of the Chinese team worked well on the bike. Junjie Fan pulled some big efforts to help keep the tempo high. Similarly Yunxiang Ma made his presence known in the front pack.
Once off the bike, a lead quartet quickly separated themselves on the run. Dart led through the opening kilometre with Fan and Furuya on his feet. Coggins was also with the leaders however Ma and Tóth had already been dropped.
Just as Coggins began to gain some fluency and settled with the leaders, though, he was slapped with a 15 second penalty. He would ultimately serve his penalty during the run. As he watched the lead trio escape into the distance, he could only brace himself as the seconds dragged by.
Although he tore out of the penalty box, he faced an uphill challenge in regaining contact.
The leaders all looked smooth, with Dart perhaps the most comfortable. In warm conditions, none of the front trio wanted to strike ahead too early and so the kilometres ticked by. As the finish drew close, Dart began to raise his knees and Furuya began to slip. The Japaneses athlete gritted his teeth and stemmed the loss of seconds, however a small gap had formed. It only took one further gentle nudge from Dart to extend that gap to 5 seconds.
Fan, however, remained clamped to Dart’s hip.
The Australian pushed again as the finish line drew closer but Fan continued to pump his arms. As the last hundred metres came into view, Dart found a slice of space and attacked. Fan summoned a final effort to keep up but it was in vain as Dart stole ahead to win by 3 seconds.
Furuya took the bronze medal, only 6 seconds back. Meanwhile, Coggins had to settle for 4th and will leave wondering what might have been without his penalty.
Women’s race
Tara Sosinski had not won an international race before. Indeed, prior to the event in Lianyungang, she had only raced internationally three times and never outside of Oceania. It would therefore have been understandable had she played it safe.
With the experience of Zsófia Kovács, the newly-acquired WTCS calibre of Xinyu Lin and the recent Osaka Asia Cup winner Niina Kishimoto in the field, there were several fancied names ready to take the gold.
Sosinski blasted them all out of contention in the swim.
With a massive split, she gained a lead of over 40 seconds. Through transition, she seemed almost caught off-guard by the absence of anyone around her. For the opening kilometre of the bike, too, she seemed a little bemused by her isolation. She glanced behind to see if anyone was coming. Yet the road was empty.
With the race course apparently to herself, Sosinski got to work.
It should be noted that Lianyungang did not have the biggest field in the world. All told only fifteen woman toed the start line. Still, a group of seven women, including Kishimoto, Lin and Kovács, set after the Australian.
If her swim had been impressive, the youngster had another trick up her sleeve. Sosinski detonated a monster bike split, putting an additional 90 seconds into the chase. No matter who took their turn on the front, the gap simply grew.
By the time she arrived in T2, Sosinksi led by over 2 minutes. However, she had not been in her position before. In her first international Olympic distance race, there was no telling how her body would react on the run.
In the chase group, Bailee Brown and Kishimoto lost ground out of T2 as Lin and Kovács began their hunt. Over the first lap the picture looked a little less hopeless as they hauled a chunk out of Sosinski’s lead. The Australian had not faltered, but she was definitely losing ground.
By the 5km mark, her lead still hovered over the minute mark. Surely that was enough. But still the question if she could hold on remained.
Sensing she was running out of time, Kovács went for broke and pulled away from Lin. The seconds tumbled but still Sosinski held on. Although Kovács out-split her by almost 90 seconds on the run, her buffer was so great that she took the win in relative comfort.
The Hungarian took a well-earned silver while Lin took the bronze medal.
View the full race results here.
