Two wins, a couple of top-10s and a generally quality level of performance showed that the local group got their preparation spot on at one of the biggest races of the year.

Mark Windsor was the star for Bathurst, destroying not just his age group rivals but the entire field – which included ex-professional and Mark’s son Blair – during the bike leg of the sprint race, before going on to take out his 55-59 years age division.

He powered around the circuit after a reasonably strong swim leg and left his opponents in his dust before crossing the line in one hour, 6.13 minutes to take first in his category and 24th overall.

A little over a minute earlier, Josh Stapley finished and would have been delighted with his fourth place effort in the 16-17 years division, making him seventh overall.

Completing the Windsor family’s contribution to the event, Blair was 14th in the 25-29 race and 84th overall, with Kerryn Windsor managing 31st in the women’s 50-54 event.

Luke Patterson gave a solid performance to manage 64th in the 40-44 race, with Caroline Robertson rounding out the Bathurst efforts by finishing 65th in the women’s 30-34 division.

A day earlier, Stapley had won the one-kilometre swim event for his age group to get his weekend off to a flying start.

Saturday’s other event was the enticer, a quick-fire race that saw another family starring, as the team of Keith and Karen Tuynman managed second place in the team’s event.

Their daughter Brooke was seventh out of almost 100 competitors in the girls’ 14-15 years individual race.

On Sunday the gluttons for punishment began the long course race and for a time, Peta Cutler was on track to finish in the top-10 in her 30-34 classification, coming out of the water in seventh and setting off on the bike.

However, disaster struck mid-way through her second lap, and she was fortunate to avoid a serious catastrophe as the tri-bar on the front of her bike snapped off.

She was forced to retire from the race, but would have been relieved not to have suffered a major fall given the nature of the incident.

Blair Watson was the other Bathurst entrant in the long course not to finish.

Tom Hanrahan starred in the 25-29 years race, crossing the line in 12th with a time of 4:25.06.

Jack English (30-34 years) was 43rd, Andrew Burke (40-44 years) came 57th, Keith Tuynman (45-49 years) managed 38th and Campbell Graham (40-44 years) was 198th.

“It was a fantastic weekend for the Bathurst group, a win for Mark and for Josh, a handful of top-10s,” Karen Tuynman said.

“Considering there were over 5,500 competitors there in total, that’s something we can be pretty proud of. 

“Mark [Windsor] is just on fire at the moment and he flew around that bike leg, it was an awesome effort.”