In a powerful sprint to the finish line, a jubilant and Olympic bound Kyle Jones (CAN) surged to gold and his first World Cup and National title win at the Edmonton ITU Triathlon World Cup.
 Kyle Jones wins at Edmonton(Photo: Arnold Lim / ITU; click to enlarge) |
Along with Lauren Campbell's victory earlier in the day, Jones' performance sealed a golden Canadian sweep, the first in an ITU World Cup since 2001.
Fellow Canadian Alexander Hinton took the podium in his World Cup debut for the silver. Jarrod Shoemaker (USA) followed the Canadian pair to take the bronze.
"To pick up my first World Cup win and National title this weekend is awesome," said Jones. "I came into this race, with four weeks of big training under my belt. I didn't know how I would react, whether I would be tired but regardless, I wanted to push hard and I am very pleased."
Under the sun's strong rays and high temperatures, the men entered the water for the 750m swim, instantly forming a gigantic pack. Upon swim exit, Andrew McCartney (CAN) took a slim two-second lead on Nils Frommhold (GER), followed closely by Mitchell Kealey (AUS) and Adam Bowden (CAN). Tim Don (GBR) headed the large pack out of the water six seconds behind the leader.
Giving a wave to the line of officials as he passed through after the first lap on the bike, Don lead the way into the second lap with Shoemaker as Sergio Sarmiento (MEX), Yanik Leduc (CAN) and Matthew Sharpe (CAN) lead the pack of roughly 20 men.
By the second lap, the large, tight knit lead group created a commanding one-minute gap between it and the next riders, spearheaded by McCartney, Bowden and Sarmiento with Don trailing in seventh position. By the end of the tough bike course, Don had regained his lead coming into transition with Jones, Bowden and Frommhold trailing by a couple of seconds.
At the end of the first lap of the run, Jones forged ahead with a 2-second lead on Manuel Huerta (USA) with Don, Shoemaker and Kealey following seven seconds behind. After the first lap of the run, the large group which had dominated the entire race began to splinter and distinct, smaller packs formed for the rest of the race.
On the last leg of the run, Kyle Jones surged ahead and found another gear, stopping the clock at 57 minutes, 33 seconds to claim his maiden ITU World Cup title.
"It's something we've been working on in training, tried to build that foot speed," said Jones. "That's what I wanted to practice today: getting out quick. You know it hurts to race like that, put yourself out in front but if that's like the Brownlees do, then you've got to do it."
Hinton put in a huge last surge to take silver, while recording the fastest run split of the day at 14:52. Celebrating a World Cup podium in his debut, Hinton was overjoyed with the outcome.
"I had a great day today," said Hinton. "It was my first World Cup. It was just one of those days where everything clicked. I had a great swim, felt good on the bike and on the run. I just let it all hang out and ended up second."
Shoemaker finished five seconds behind Hinton to complete the podium. Tim Don crossed the line in fourth place wile Huerta rounded out the top five.
Earlier in the day in the PATCO Pan American Junior Championships, Mexico's Fabian Villanueva won the gold medal while Canadian Tyler Mislawchuk took the silver and Eduardo Moreno of Mexico, raced to a bronze.
