Race Coverage

Her Best Race Yet? Maybe...

Tuesday, 29 July 2014 00:10

CHISAGO LAKES SPRINT - In her blog Heather Lendway stated that her course record performance at Life Time Tri - Minneapolis was her best Olympic-distance effort ever.

What was her best sprint race ever?

It HAD to have been her dominating performance at Chisago Sprint on Sunday. There she led out of the water and was second into T2 behind pro male Dan Hedgecock, who would go on to record his 27th career win. And though Hedgecock broke Devon Palmer's men's course record, he could only managed to finish 3:25 ahead of Lendway, who was never overtaken by male triathletes during the final phase, a 5K run....

Coming into the race many wondered if the undefefeated (in 2014) amateur Lendway could match the 1:19:00 set by decorated pro Lauren Goss in 2012. At the very least, everyone assumed she would finish somewhere between Goss' mark and the amateur CR (1:23:28, set in 2012) by Suzie Fox.

HL's final time was totally sick: 1:17:15!

Now a new question is floating out there: What is Heather's best performance ever? Her win at Nationals in 2013? Her long course debut win in Bend (2013)? Her Minneapolis victory?

Could it be that her win last Sunday in Minnesota's "Little Sweden," admittedly at a regionally, not nationally, iconic event, was her best effort to date?

It could be. We're anxious to see what Heather has to say in her blog. Yes, we will post that story on MTN.

In addition to the records set by Hedgecock and Lendway, several age groupers added their names to the record books:

- 50-54W - Tracy Serreyn's 1:30:28 lowered Robin Tedlund's 2010 record by 2:37.

- 55-59W - Megan Webster's 1:38:36 took Toni St. Pierre's 2010 AG mark by 1:35.

- 60-64M - Bill Schmidt's 1:25:54 took a corpulent bite (5:10) out of Barry Clark's former CR.

- 65-69M - Ben Ewer's lowered his 2012 AG best 1:30:57 to 1:30:02.

- 65-69W - Nancy Bauer's 1:59:13 was more than 35 minutes faster than the prior divisional best. RESULTS

Photo - Bridget McCoy, who podiumed (3rd) at Chisago last Sunday.