TERRY Roberts put together a sharp run leg to score an age group victory in Sunday’s Ironman 70.3 Asia-Pacific Championship in Western Sydney.
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The Bathurst competitor was sitting second in his age group during the final transition but shot into the lead in the opening kilometres of the run.
Roberts recorded a time of four hours, 50 minutes and three seconds.
In a great demonstration of his stamina the next closest competitor in Roberts’ age category was 15:25 off the pace.
It was a big feat from Roberts who was backing up just a month and a half after the Ironman World Championship in Hawaii.
“I’d entered this race before I’d qualified for Hawaii and I came back here thinking ‘Do I really want to do this?’,” Roberts said.
“I had an idea of where my opponents were going into the run and in the end I won by about 15 minutes.
“I’ve only just gone up an age group and I still would have been competitive in the one below.”
Roberts would still have managed a fourth place result if he were racing in his previous 50-55 years division.
In Sunday’s race Roberts exited the 1.9 kilometre swim in second place. His leg of 35:39 meant he was giving up half a minute to division leader Paul McGlynn.
The gap between the pair went out slightly over the bike leg, to two minutes, but the Bathurst athlete excelled on the run.
Roberts’ effort in the 55-59 years category was one of several strong performances for Bathurst participants in the Ironman Asia-Pacific Championship race.
Roberts played down his individual effort and said the other Bathurst entrants could hold their heads high after their races.
“For me the standout was Nick North and Tom Hanrahan also had a fantastic race. He’s improved out of sight. He’s been very solid across all his legs and he doesn’t have the luxury of time for training like some of us do,” he said.
“Andrew Burke got through a difficult day. He had a puncture on the bike leg which hurt his time but he made it home.
“Chris Walsh finished with a 5:09 and he was really happy with how he did. He’s more focused on his running but he likes having a go at triathlon as well.
“I know Keith Tuynman was really excited to race alongside his daughter [Brooke] and they both had a great race.”
The father-daughter pairing of Keith and Brooke Tuynman narrowly missed the five hour mark as they posted a strong result of 5:05:21.
The team finished inside the top 20 across all three of their legs to be the 11th mixed team home.
North was the highest overall Bathurst finisher in 25th.
A tough run leg dropped North from the lead in his division back to fourth. He surrendered the lead with seven kilometres left and arrived in 4:09:10.
Walsh’s strength was the final leg was evident as he climbed from 285th at the final transition to 236th overall by the end of the race.
Hanrahan managed to finish inside the top 100 with his time of 4:40:18 and was 13th in his division.
The tough day on the bike saw Burke finish in just over six hours.