Jonathan Brownlee returned to the top of the podium with a convincing victory on Saturday at the 2015 ITU World Triathlon Gold Coast, delivering him back to back wins in the series. He was the master, rallying the lead group on the bike to set himself up with the winning break he needed, stopping the clock at 1:46:53 and earning his tenth WTS win.
It was the first time winning Yokohama and Madrid back in 2013 that Brownlee had won consecutive WTS races.
"At the start of the season I had an awful race, it was a little bit of a shock really because I got a lot of things wrong so I knew I did not want to make those mistakes again. Today it started really well, had a great start in the swim, had to get around a few people to get on Richard Varga's feet and then we had a gap, I saw the four of us and knew I just had to ride aggressive and on tempo," said Brownlee."
On my run I knew that if I could be steady and get them behind me by thirty then it was going to take a great run to catch me but luckily they didn't."
 Jonathan Brownlee takes the tape(Photo: Delly Carr / ITU; click to enlarge) |
In almost a repeat of the 2009 ITU Junior Men's World Championship race, Mario Mola claimed silver with the fastest run split (29:44). In 2009, Mola beat Brownlee to take the junior men's world championship title. Spain's Javier Gomez rounded out the podium, and in a great day for the men's Spanish team, Vicente Hernandez came in fourth.
Under partly cloudy skies but temperate conditions, two-laps of a 1.5km swim was led out by the familiar figure of Richard Varga (SVK). Right on his heels was Brownlee, once onto the bike he established his role as the conductor, pushing the group of four that also included Igor Polyanskiy and Dmitry Polyanskiy (RUS) to make sure they worked together and kept the pace high for the majority of the eight-lap technical course.
They continued to extend their lead from the chase group that contained all the big names Javier Gomez, Mario Mola, Richard Murray but at the start of the six lap Igor Plyanskiy crashed going into a corner reducing the lead group to three. The second and third chase groups merged and set about reducing the one minute gap.
Murray, Benjamin Shaw (IRL), Brendan Sexton (AUS), Kristian Blummenfelt (NOR) Ben Kanute (USA), Gomez and Ryan Bailie (AUS) all contributed to the effort and at the final change the gap was down to a 21-second deficit and applying some pressure to the three up front.
Brownlee was the first to clear out and the first kilometre saw a group of Spainards including Mola, Gomez and Vincente Hernandez formed the group to set about chasing down Brownlee.
Mola seized his opportunity and grabbed a small lead in the last lap to earn himself the silver medal and his second time on the podium this year after winning in Abu Dhabi
"That is racing, we were in the third pack in the beginning, we could not close that gap but Jonny was amazing today he did a lot of work on the bike and then ran like a maniac so congratulations to him," said Mola. "I am very happy with my performance, I think it has been a great race for all of the Spanish athletes, we are doing well."
Gomez grabbed the bronze medal and the last spot on the podium when he also pushed in the last lap to break away from Hernandez.
"It was very tough today. I felt better towards the end of the run but the first laps I struggled on the pace," said Gomez. "It was kind of an average race out there for me, my swim was not great, it was not my best day but I secured a spot on the podium which is always good. Jonny was strong today and so was Mola."
Results: ITU World Triathlon, Gold Coast
Elite Men
1. Jonathan Brownlee (GBR) 1:46:53
2. Mario Mola (ESP) 1:47:11
3. Javier Gomez Noya (ESP) 1:47:21
4. Vicente Hernandez (ESP) 1:47:26
5. Richard Murray (RSA) 1:47:45
6. Pierre Le Corre (FRA) 1:47:55
7. Fernando Alarza (ESP) 1:48:18
8. Joao Pereira (POR) 1:48:19
9. Ryan Bailie (AUS) 1:48:23
10. Courtney Atkinson (AUS) 1:48:30
