Mt Maunganui triathlete Janine Sax has shrugged off pre-race course drama and severe dehydration to finish ninth at the ITU World Long Distance championships in Las Vegas.
Cold air and water temperatures in the Nevada desert forced organisers to can the 4km swim leg due to concerns over athlete safety. Instead triathletes started the bike in staggered five-second intervals.
Competing as an elite for the first time at a world championship race, Sax attacked early on the 120km cycle leg before her race started unravelling in unnerving fashion.
"My drink bottles kept popping out of the single bottle cage on my bike after the first aid station [and] in the end I went for nearly two hours of racing in the desert without any water, meaning I couldn't take on any nutrition either," Sax said yesterday from Las Vegas.
"By the time I did collect water during the second half of the bike I was cooked. At that point I knew there would be a real risk I was doing irreparable damage to my body and needed to decide whether to pull out."
Two weeks earlier Sax had run out of water while cycling in the desert and took a week to recover. "Back then I had only been cycling in my training zone for about 20 minutes without water - here I was at nearly twice the intensity for nearly eight times that length of time."
Sax didn't even bother picking up any fluids at the final aid station on the bike leg, figuring she would head back in to transition and the end of her race.
"After re-assessing my physical state [at transition], knowing I was still in the top 10 and really wanting to finish I decided that if I took in fluid at every station I should still be able to finish [the 30km run] safely.
"But one of the consequences of dehydration is that you basically loose everything in your stomach, so not only was I collecting [fluid] at every aid station but I was also making frequent visits to the portaloos every lap."
Sax negotiated the first lap slowly but churned out even splits for the remaining three laps, despite her ongoing visits to the toilets."
She finished in 6h 2m 43s, 28 minutes behind the winner.
"By the time I hit the finish line I was actually feeling quite good and looking strong."
Sax is at a loss to explain why her water bottles continually exited her cage. "It's possible that during the intial stages of this race I was hitting those bumps faster than what I had previously done."
And the good news wasn't limited to Sax, with Te Puna's Debbie Clark winning bronze in the 55-59 years age group race. Clark got home in 7h 18m 11s.
Tauranga's Terri Mann was 11th in the 25-29 years age group in 6h 47m 38s Luana Cox (35-39 years) 13th in 6h 51m 26s Heidi Jane James (30-34) 36th in 7h 39m 53s and Meryl Wanless (45-49 years) 30th in 8h 8m 27s.