Whanganui teen Zoe Anderson becomes youngest solo woman to finish Crazyman multisport race

Whanganui's Zoe Anderson (right) set a junior record for the youngest solo female finisher at the Fine Signs Crazyman race in Wellington, finishing third behind Deb Lynch (left) and Zoe McClure. Photo / Michael Jacques

At 16 years old, Zoe Anderson from Whanganui has become the youngest solo female finisher of the Fine Signs Crazyman multisport event in Wellington.

Anderson finished third in the open women’s event with a time of 4h 47m 27s.

Wellington’s Deb Lynch and Timaru’s Zoe McClure finished first and second, respectively.

The Crazyman is an annual multisport event, held in Wellington, where competitors kayak 13km, mountain bike 34km and finish with a 13km trail run.

It started in 1991.

“That was probably one of the toughest races I’ve ever been in but the feeling when you cross the finish line was pretty cool,” Anderson said.

“When I finally crossed the line I was just telling myself, ‘I’m done, I did the Crazyman’.”

She said she did not expect to finish with a new record and was just hoping to cross the line.

Last year, Anderson competed for the first time in the school teams category with her brother Charlie Anderson and kayaking teammate Alexis Toy.

They set a record in that category, crossing the line in 3h 46m 18s.

Anderson was inspired to do the solo challenge after her father Brian Anderson, co-owner of The Bike Shed in Whanganui, signed up.

Brian had previously raced about 20 years ago and Zoe’s brother Charlie had completed the solo challenge too, which motivated her.

“I sort of wanted to follow in their footsteps so I ended up racing my dad this year, but he had to pull out, he DNFed [did not finish], which was a bit of a bugger but there’s always next year I suppose,” she said.

Anderson balanced out her training in the months leading up to the event.

She would mountain bike once or twice a week, run 10km off-road each week and minimise kayak paddling.

She indirectly got some training in at the Tikitapu Sprint Regatta 1 on December 6-7, where she impressed in multiple K4, K2 and solo races.

For the Crazyman, her plan was to pace herself with the kayaking start, which she finished just three minutes behind Lynch.

Anderson took the same approach to the start of the mountain bike before she reached the first, and biggest, hill.

“It’s a bit of a killer,” she said.

“For the last 400m I had to push my bike because it was so steep and rocky.”

During the trail run, Anderson was throwing up on the side of the road and “just surviving” for the last 2km before crossing the line.

She will enter her final year at Cullinane College in 2026.

There are several kayaking regattas she is looking forward to and she wants to start mountain biking competitively.

Anderson hopes to compete at the Mountain Bike National Championships in Rotorua in March.

Fin Ocheduszko Brown is a multimedia journalist based in Whanganui.