Gwen Jorgensen and Reece Vannerson Storm to Big Wins at Americas Triathlon Cup Miami

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Originally published at: Gwen Jorgensen and Reece Vannerson Storm to Big Wins at Americas Triathlon Cup Miami - Slowtwitch News

The top American draft-legal racers don’t have a chance to race too often in the United States, so a chance to compete on home soil is always popular – especially when there’s a break in the WTCS schedule. Which is why there were more than a few big names on hand for today’s racing at Homestead Miami Speedway, including Olympic gold medalist Gwen Jorgensen and Olympic silver medalist from the mixed relay in Paris last year, Seth Rider. Add to that the likes of last year’s junior world silver medalist Reece Vannerson, who arrived in Miami fresh off a big win at the Americas Triathlon Cup La Paz last weekend, and there was reason to be excited about the field competing.

In the end both the top-seeds would run their way to the win as Jorgensen and Vannerson flew through the 5 km runs to take the day, but neither had an easy time of it. Thanks to the incredible winds – gusts were reported up to 45 km/ h (28 mph) – all three legs of the race were affected at some point. Here’s how the day played out.

5 km Run Decides the Day

American Gina Sereno led the women out of the water, with Canadian Sophia Howell close behind. Jorgensen had a great swim and hit the beach in eighth place, just 11 seconds behind Sereno. By the end of the first loop there was a group of 18 out in front, that included Jorgensen, but the chase group, with Bermudan Olympian Erica Hawley driving the pace, was just 18 seconds back. By the end of the second loop that chase group had joined the lead bunch, setting up a monstrous 35-woman pack. A lap later another five women joined the fun, setting up a group of 40 to cruise through the rest of the ride.

Canada’s Noemie Beaulieu put herself in a great position to finish the bike and charge out onto the run course in the lead, but only seconds separated the women as they started the two-loop 5 km run course through the speedway. It didn’t take Jorgensen long to charge to the front, though and soon she had broken clear, but still had Mexico’s Marcela Alvarez Solis on her heels through the 3 km point of the run. American Danielle Orie was third at that point, seven seconds down, with Sereno another seven seconds down in fourth.

Jorgensen would finally be able to create some daylight between her and Alvarez Solis, hitting the line four seconds up to take the win. Orie hung tough for third, while Sereno suffered down the finish chute (throwing up) and would lose a few spots to Italy’s Beatrice Mallozzi and countrywoman Naomi Ruff in the sprint to take sixth.

Women’s Top 10:

  • Gwen Jorgensen (USA) 55:41
  • Marcela Alvarez Solis (MEX) 55:45
  • Danielle Orie (USA) 55:55
  • Beatrice Mallozzi (ITA) 56:00
  • Naomi Ruff (USA) 56:01
  • Gina Sereno (USA) 56:05
  • Erica Hawley (BER) 56:05
  • Mercedes Romero Orozco (MEX) 56:12
  • Heidi Jurankova (CZE) 56:15
  • Molly Lakustiak (CAN) 56:28

Vannerson Charges Through

Despite the fierce wind, the men managed to be even more bunched up coming out of the water, but thanks to a speedy transition a group of six were able to break clear on the bike including America’s Darr Smith and Seth Rider, Canada’s Ben Fah and Chris Gregor, along with Mexico’s Nicolas Probert Vargas and Dylan Didier Campa Carranza. Swim leader Igor Dupuis tried to breach up to the group, but was a tantalizing four seconds back along with Vannerson.

The first chase group was about 20 seconds back at the end of two laps, and then lost more time when the third chase group managed to bridge up – heading into the final of five laps the chasers were 50 seconds behind the lead group, which was down to five after Campa Carranza got dropped.

By the end of the bike the lead group of five had a gap of 50 seconds on the chasers, but that lead wouldn’t be enough. Vannerson, fresh off the win last week in La Paz, and also fresh off a recent sub-14-minute 5 km run performance, screamed past the men in front by the halfway point of the run. The young American continued to charge clear and would finish the race 17 seconds up on Dupuis, with Smith rounding out the podium.

Men’s Top 10

  • Reese Vannerson (USA) 49:54
  • Igor Dupuis (FRA) 50:12
  • Darr Smith (USA) 50:14
  • Seth Rider (USA) 50:16
  • Martin Sobey (CAN) 50:16
  • Braxton Legg (USA) 50:22
  • Aram Michell Penaflor Moysen (MEX) 50:26
  • Mathis Beaulieu (CAN) 50:30
  • Erik Yamir Ramos Croda (MEX) 50:36
  • Daniel Damian (CAN) 50:43
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yes it was windy, and Vannerson ran 1st 3km in 8:41 to get the lead I think by the half way point. As cool of a venue it is, spectating kinda sucks cus of so many different barrier fences throughout the venue.

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this race was also venue of college nationals. so jealous of this venue

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It’s a little bit insane why they havent figure that out.

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I may be completly out of the loop but why is Gwen racing in a lower level event with mostly up and coming athletes some of whom are 20 years younger. What is her end game at nearing 40 years of age, it cant be for the love of the sport as she claimed she never liked the sport that much in the distant past, is she trying to hang on for financial reasons? Sorry if i’m completly out of the loop on her situation.

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Easy[quote=“pokey, post:5, topic:1287419, full:true”]
I may be completly out of the loop but why is Gwen racing in a lower level event with mostly up and coming athletes some of whom are 20 years younger. What is her end game at nearing 40 years of age, it cant be for the love of the sport as she claimed she never liked the sport that much in the distant past, is she trying to hang on for financial reasons? Sorry if i’m completly out of the loop on her situation.
[/quote]

Gaming the system for easy points.

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“Gaming the system”

But for what end, she’s almost 40? Is it for money or enjoyment?

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I would say like sanders she races so slowtwitch has something to talk about
and to keep draft legal tri at least somewhat relevant on this forum lol…

I would say as long as she manages to trigger slowtwitch (positively or negatively is irrelevant) she will make enough money from the sport.

more interestingly with Naomi Roof there is really the first usa NAAC triathlete athlete that could make it to the olympics.

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I think she has said it, the race was here and an easy trip, it was a relatively sure win, or at lest podium, she gets some points, she gets some money(she is still a pro triathlete), and there was nothing else going on this weekend, or even near it.

She’s 38, not 40, so not sure why you have aged her prematurely. Many athletes have raced at the top until their early 40’s, Think Jan won a T100 at 41 before retiring. And it appears that she seems to be having fun, maybe for the first time in her career, so there is that too.

As for making our home olympics, unless someone comes up quickly in the next couple years, she has a great shot for one of the spots. Not that I think she will factor overall in the actual games, but making our team will probably be easier than it has ever been since the games began this time around…

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I said she’s almost 40, she turns 40 in 13 months. I was confused why she was racing with lower level athletes but perhaps that’s the level she is at right now.

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You just decided to conveniently skip the first paragraph from Monty only to defend yourself re: her age, huh. Very cool move.

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Who in the field are you dating? Did you read the rest of Monty’s post. He gave 3 reasons all of which you ignored.

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I saw that COROS has a great writeup about the youth develop of the winner Reese Vannerson, with the rarely seen detailed stats of mileage, volume, etc over periods of training in middle and high school. Impressive how good he could get with low volume training.

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I guess I just don’t think it’s cool then that an olympic gold medalist is cherry picking wins from lower level events meant for developing athletes, its kinda like tiger woods entering his home course club championship, there is no rule against it but its kind of bush league in my books. It also looks like and aging athIete sticking around to long. I will say no more this is just my view.

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The ITU schedule is very wonky this year with so much time between WTCS races (months between races), that doing a “local” race sorta makes sense just to keep things moving. The points she earned don’t really matter or help her because this is such a low level race and she has such a high ranking, this was just more a race to race because there’s nothing else to do (besides training). So I don’t necessarily think this was trying to beat up on the young pups, as it was ITU’s WTCS schedule had a 3 month long break in between races.

Just a point of reference Seth Rider an silver medalist from Paris showed up and raced for the men (rust buster for him as he’s moving towards more non itu racing this year; racing Oceanside next week).

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Now this is what the kids call: delulu.

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Well looks like Knibb and Spivey will be moving on, so who is ahead of her right now? Who is even in the same zip code coming up the pipeline??

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I disagree. It’s a great chance for the up and comers to see firsthand how a more experienced high performing athlete races and gives potential for both learning and even upsets. I see it as a positive for top athletes to get exposure to even more top athletes and see what it takes to compete at that level. After all, that’s what they’re shooting for and are going to face on the world class stage.

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That’s the unfortunate place of where we’re in. The Federation threw money at here for 18 months to “correct a perceived wrong”? Instead of investing the travel money in someone who could use the support. (She clearly has plenty of sponsor cash)

I would say in some respects she’s the only one in the WTCS ranking that may stick other than Ackerlund. We’ve got Spivey (13), Ackerlund (14), Jorgensen (29).

So really from a cycle perspective we have:

  • Erika Ackerlund, 29

Total World Rankings right now the only one younger than Ackerlund is Knibb who is 27, Sereno is 30. So the questions should be not around how do we keep Gwen…but what do we have to do to keep Taylor Knibb? Clearly completely failed there.

So who should USAT be throwing resources at? The Americas Triathlon Cup gives us a nice list:

  • Danielle Orie
  • Naomi Ruff
  • Jimena Renata de la Pena Schott

So I can conced that yes, it appears Gwen will make LA because she’s one of two that will remain active that is currently racing WTCS. BUT I will posit that this is another MASSIVE failure by USAT HP. And perhaps that’s a different discussion. But alas, what was the purpose of all this NCAA Tri money we’ve been spending if we’re not going to keep the Liberty Ricca in the sport.

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Ruff I’m pretty sure is on u23 funding team from usat.