Cowichan Bay’s Desirae Ridenour had a pair of top-10 finishes at the ITU Junior World Triathlon Grand Finals held at Gold Coast, Australia last month.
Ridenour finished eighth in the individual event, where she was the top Canadian, and was part of the Canadian junior/U23 mixed relay team that placed seventh.
Ridenour finished the individual race in one hour and nine seconds (10:14 swim, 30:72 cycle, 18:27 run), 59 seconds out of first place and two seconds back of seventh. The next Canadian was Victoria’s Hannah Henry, who finished 12th in 1:00:18.
The Canadian team finished the mixed relay in 1:22:46, 2:19 back of first-place France and 17 seconds back of the sixth-place Americans.
“I’m pretty disappointed with how the individual race turned out,” Ridenour said in an email. “An error in the swim (pushed off course), left me chasing. I missed the lead pack by a few seconds. Consequently, I rode solo for the first lap until I got caught by the chase pack. I did the best I could to salvage the race, but it wasn’t enough to get the result I was hoping. Unfortunately, making small mistakes at a World Champs can have big consequences.”
Earlier this month, Ridenour finished 14th at an elite women’s World Cup race in Salinas, Ecuador, where she was again the top Canadian with a time of 59:11 (9:39/30:17/17:30). She is currently in Europe for Super League events in Malta and Mallorca.
