The early bird catches the worm but even they were still asleep when the athletes had to line up to race in Subic Bay. With both the men’s and women’s races at the Asia Cup in the Philippines kicking off before 6am, there were a couple of bleary eyes on the start lines.
In a slightly unusual turn of events, the women’s race started in a wave shortly after the men rather than as a separate event.
Despite the early start, once the starter’s signal went off, the athletes stepped up to produce some fast showings.
Men’s race
Panagiotis Bitados swam to an early lead as he was the only man to dip under the 9 minute mark in the water. After winning a silver medal on his Continental Cup debut in South Africa, Bitados gained a 6 second advantage into T1. Oscar Dart was the second man to emerge in 9:05.
A large pack quickly coalesced around Bitados and Dart on the bike as the likes of Ren Sato and Jumpei Furuya moved to the front to take control of the race. With over twenty men in the front group, though, there was no real scope to launch an attack. Even someone with Furuya’s pedigree from the WTCS had to be content to sit in the pack for the most part.
All eyes, it seemed, had turned to the run.
The long run in T2 managed to stretch the front pack a little as Dart, Sato, Furuya and Joshua Ferris had the best transitions.
Although Jason Tai Long Ng and a couple of others tried to keep pace, Dart and Ferris stormed ahead over the 5km. After a win at the Asia Cup in Ipoh last November, Ferris matched Dart in the early parts of the run. His compatriot, though, pulled clear towards the end, taking the win on the back of a field-leading split of 14:32.
Ferris clocked a split of 14:38 which was enough to hold off Sato by 11 seconds. Neither Dart nor Ferris have a race lined up in the next month and it will be fascinating to see whether they can kick on over the course of this season.
Genta Uchida followed in 4th place while Furuya rounded out the top-5.
Women’s race
Mikayla Messer was in a class of her own in the swim and gained a substantial lead over the field. With no one within 20 seconds of her, she had time to go through the motions in T1 in peace.
Aleisha Wesley and Yifan Yang dragged the field through the swim and then onto Messer’s wheel on the bike as a big front pack formed. Like the men’s race, there was precious little opportunity to force the pace off the front. Charlotte Mcshane was on paper the premier name in the group, although Yang arrived in Subic Bay in form while the winner of the Dexing Asia Cup, Anqi Huang, was also in the pack.
With no one gaining any real time on the bike, the race narrowed into a 5km shoot-out.
Ellie Hoitink and Mcshane led the way out of T2 with Yang, Huang and Meiyi Lu in close pursuit. Yang pulled alongside Mcshane and Hoitink as the field behind stretched into a long line. As the pace began to tell, Huang lost touch with the leaders but Lu managed to just about hang on.
In the closing stages, Mcshane pulled clear to take the win by 9 seconds. Behind her, Yang and Hoitink battled for silver and it was the Chinese athlete, Yang, that managed to cross the line first.
After an impressive run of performances in Oceania Cups, including a 4th place in Taupo in February, Hoitink won her first ever Continental Cup medal. Yang, too, as an athlete on the rise. With both women being born in 2000, they can be expected to go up against one another in the future, with a showdown at the World U23 Championships later this year potentially on the cards.
Meiyu Lu and Anqi Huang completed the top-5 in Subic Bay. The big story of the day, though, was Mcshane.
Subic Bay represented only the second international win of her career after her World U23 triumph in 2013. Given she was a WTCS medallist from Cozumel in 2016, that fact was a little surprising. Nevertheless, her win should set her up well for the rest of her season.
View the full results here.
