Race Coverage
Olivia & Dani Lead the Way at One Last Tri...
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Sunday, 15 September 2019 23:10
Photo - The Four Musketlessteers (L-R) - Tom Krueger, Luke Harned, Michell Sanders and Tom Couillard. Harned, Sanders and Coulliard were AG winners.
ONE LAST TRI - A pair of insanely talented women that we don't see often, stole the show last Sunday at the 14th edition of One Last Tri. Taking the women's title in the Sprint was OLIVIA MELHORN, formerly Olivia Bagnall, whose last triathlon appearance was at Lake Minnetonka in 2017, where she placed 3rd.
A former collegiate and pro soccer star (and current soccer coach), Olivia started dabbling in triathlon in 2013, a year in which she won two of the four tris she did and was runner-up behind NICOLE HEININGER for Rookie of the Year. Since then, she's raced in 13 multis, including OLT, winning seven of them and finishing outside the Top 5 only once.
Why haven't we seen more of her in the last few years? She's been busy coaching and starting a family with her former college football player husband. They have a baby girl who is totally cute!
Melhorn's time at OLT Sprint was 1:04:56, which landed her in 3rd place overall among the 227 finishers, just 1:12 behind the men's winner DEREK PARKER, and 1:02 after men's runner-up JASON FISCHER, who had a breakout season in 2019, highlighted by his win at Fairmont Sprint and his 3rd at Trinona Sprint.
Second place in the women's Sprint was earned by SIMONE LUNDQUIST, a performance that made the day, her 17th birthday, all the sweeter, and likely helped her nab first Junior of the Year nomination....
Melhorn making the overall podium in the Sprint was impressive, exclipsed only by DANI VSETECKA's outright victory in OLT's 105 finisher Olympic-easque race. Plagued by injuries the last two seasons, DV nevertheless managed to win four of the six races she entered during that period, and three of those efforts were definitely Performance of the Year nomination-worthy.
Vsetecka plans to race at Augusta (GA) 70.3 later this fall, a race she won convincingly in 2018.
We won't bet against her.
Rounding out the OLT Oly podium was BILL KELLEY, winner of the Shell Lake Triathlon in late July, and ANDREW BAUER.
Super-impressive AG performances were turned in by NOAH BILLINGS, 13, who placed 4th overall in the Sprint, and LUKE HARNED, 67, whose 1:13:07 was faster than all men over the age of 50. Harned appears to be a shoo-in for a 2019 Grand Master of the Year nomination.
