Gisborne pair achieve C2C goals

A109 Light Utility Helicopter flight with mayor Gisborne City from the air in November 2023.

TWELFTH place in the open men, third best of the classic women; Gisborne’s two competitors in the Coast to Coast accomplished their Coast to Coast missions in style by the time they crossed the finishing line at New Brighton Beach on Saturday.

After two days of racing on foot, bike and kayak for 243 kilometres across the South Island, first-timers George Williams and Jo Teesdale produced two of the best results recorded by Gisborne competitors at this iconic event.

Williams produced a stunner of a run through the field in the alps on Day 1 to be sixth to reach Klondyke Corner, taking under six hours and finishing less than two minutes from second place in the two-dayer open men’s division.

Timing data on the C2C website showed he passed 40 runners by the time he reached the 14km checkpoint on the 33km mountain crossing.

But it was always going to be tough for the 31-year-old farmer to hold that position on the bike and river on Day 2 of his first C2C.

Race data showed he fell back on the long 67km kayak section out of the mountains but gained a few places back on the 70km ride across the Canterbury Plains.

At the finish line, he had still put more than three-quarters of the open men’s field behind him — an impressive 12th in that division, 19th of the 116 male competitors and 21st of about 170 individuals overall, in a race time of 14 hours 40 minutes.

Third of sevenEqually impressive, Jo Teesdale was third of seven in the 50-to-59-year age group and 31st of 56 solo women competitors, most of them in the younger divisions. She maintained the position she was in overnight at Klondyke Corner, eight hours 29 minutes into the race. Her total race time was 17 hours 29 minutes, placing her 97th overall.

She did her ground work in the mountains, lost some places on the cycle to the river, then climbed back through the field on the water.

The Gisborne orchardist is an experienced multisporter but the river had been her concern, with a late change of boat after she accidentally damaged her kayak. The timing splits showed it to be one of her strong legs.

Gisborne’s Amy Spence and two friends finished fourth in the open women’s category and were seventh women in the teams event, 50th team to finish overall.

Greymouth-based former Wairoa athlete Sam Manson continues to challenge the world’s best. He was third in the one-dayer, the world championship race. He held third place at each checkpoint while the epic battle for the world title was fought out in front of him by two former champions, Sam Clark and Braden Currie.

It was 25-year-old Manson’s best result after finishing fourth two years ago.

Gisborne veteran multisporter Pete Lamont returned home at the weekend with an armload of age-group medals from a week of competition at the New Zealand Masters Games in Whanganui. These included three golds in multisport kayak racing, a clutch of golds and a bronze in the pool, silvers in duathlon and triathlon, and bronzes in cross-country, stair racing and a 5km road race.