Race Previews
The Epic-est Battle...
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Monday, 07 July 2014 07:00
13th Annual MINNEAPOLIS TRIATHLON - Elite Amateur Women - In 2011, Massachusetts' Catherine Sterling set the women's Elite Amateur course record at the Minneapolis Triathlon. Her time, 2:10:52, should go down hard on Saturday.
How hard?
Our guess is that it will take a 2:07 to win the women's EA title at the 13th annual Life Time Tri - Minneapolis. Why? Because the two women that are currently redefining the amateur standards for American female triathletes will be facing each other.
We're talking about defending USAT National Champion Heather Lendway of St. Paul (photo L), and Dani Fischer, who grew up in Rochester, played collegiate soccer at UW-Madison and now resides in Wausau, Wisconsin.
Lendway was runner-up for USAT Athlete of the Year in 2013 and she is even faster this year, a season in which she is undefeated in five starts with an average margin of victory of 9:42!...
Here's what Dani (photo L), who like HL, is in her 3rd season of multisport racing, has accomplished this season:
- 1st amateur - 2nd overall (RBM) - @ Apple Duathlon (Margin: 2:43)
- 1st @ USAT Long Course Nationals - 4:23:37 (Margin over runnerup--2013 AOY Kirsten Sass--4:24)
1st @ Best of the US Championship (Margin over runner-up--two-time USAT National Champ Jennifer Garrison--4:07)
1st @ ITU Chicago World Triathlon - 2:03:43 (Margin over runner-up--Sass--2:13)
Making the confrontation more interesting, and certainly more gruesome, will be the presence of seven-time Minneapolis winner, Cathy Yndestad (photo below) of Rosemount, who is a 
former US AOY (2009), and Duluth's Elaine Nelson, who may be the best kept "Elite Amateur" secret in our sport. Like Fischer, Nelson, who has quietly won eight of the ten multis she raced in thus far, will finish with a 36-37-minute 10K. For CY, it will be her 13th appearance in this race. Yup, she's made it to every Mpls Tri starting line.
If Lendway and/or Fischer falter on Saturday, Yndestad and/or Nelson will be there to pick up the pieces. If they don't, the first woman across the line will most likely go on to be named the 2014 USAT Athlete of the Year.
We can't wait to see how this epic battle turns out.
ALSO - We predict that either Diane Hankee of Lino Lakes, Holland Smith, 16, of St. Joseph, Missouri, or Summer Ohlendorf of Madison, Wisconsin, will round out the women's Top 5.
