Oakey & O’Brien Quick in Carlow
It was a day for (relative) newcomers in Round 1 of the 2022 Triathlon National Series as Jonathan Oakey and Emma O’Brien were too quick for the competition at Tri795 in Carlow.
The first round of the series saw just under 300 athletes take the start line for a 750m swim in the river Barrow; an out-and-back 20km bike and a mixed terrain riverside 5km run to the finish.
Oakey and O’Brien won their races by some margin. Oakey went well under the hour mark for this victory with second place claimed by Matthieu Proffit and Luke McMullan in third.
Emma O’Brien as almost two minutes ahead by the time she crossed the line. Just a few weeks after winning the Duathlon National Champs, Ciara Wilson showed her swimming is in good shape by finishing in 2nd place with Megan Roberts coming from way back in wave 4 to claim third overall.
Full results are available on SportsSplits.com
Oakey In Front from Stroke One
Was the water warm yet, or was it going to be be shockingly cold was the question on most people’s lips as the assembled triathletes made, what was for most of them, their season debut. After a two year absence, Tri795 was back on the calendar and conditions could scarcely have been better. (By the way, reports suggest the water was warm-ish.)
From the off, Leeds University student Jonathan Oakey made his intent clear, pulling ahead of his wave which contained the race’s top swimmers before he had covered even 100m of the river.
Oakey, who we last saw racing the Super Series at Mourne Triathlon four years ago, swam the course in 00:08:35 – easily the quickest of the day and almost two minutes quicker than any of his competition.
He came close to breaking 30mins on the bike too – showing no signs of letting up as he came in to T2.
Oakey duly smashed the 5km run, covering the distance in 00:14:21 to win with a very impressive time of 00:55:57 – more than five minutes quicker than the rest of the competition.
Behind Oakey, Matthieu Proffit and Belpark’s Luke McMullan were having a close run race for second. Proffit was among a small group of three – alongside eventual women’s winner Emma O’Brien and 4th placed finisher Charlotte Moore – that came out of the water together and ahead of the everyone else in either race bar Oakey.
McMullan gave up more than a minute on the swim but once on dry land started pulling time back. Four seconds in T1, 17secs on the bike, another four in T2. He ran a fast 00:15:39 but just up ahead, Proffit was digging deep too. He completed the 5km in 00:16:13 to stay 20secs clear at the line and finished 2nd to McMullan’s 3rd.
O’Brien Makes Winning Debut
In her first ever triathlon, Emma O’Brien could scarcely have done better – the second quickest swim of any athlete in the field and a highly competitive bike & run saw her cross the line in 01:07:51. With a background in surf lifesaving and running, plus the same coaching team that has guided Carolyn Hayes to Olympic achievement, O’Brien put the elements of her first triathlon together capably and said afterwards that she went in to the race without any expectation, just the intention of working hard.
“I just said, give it a shot, I bought a bike in October and kinda went from there. I had practised it and (her coach) Eanna (McGrath) guided me through it, you do need to practice before you do it!”
Aside from O’Brien, the women’s race witnessed an incredibly close three way battle for the next two podium spots with teenager Charlotte Moore swimming very strongly to head on to the bike in first position.
Duathlon National Champ Ciara Wilson emerged from the water with a two minute deficit – all of which she made up on the bike to overtake Moore. This, combined with her 00:17:16 run split saw her finish comfortably in second place. Third place went to Megan Roberts in a true come from behind performance. Roberts started back in Wave 4 and presumably had to navigate her way through a fair bit of traffic to finish the race in 01:10:52 – a time that turned out to be five seconds quicker than Moore by the time both had crossed the line.
Results and Images
Provisional Results are available on SportsSplits.com and the scoring from Round 1 of the Triathlon National Series 2022 will be posted to the rankings page shortly.
We’ve also got a great gallery of images from the day by James Lawlor so if you raced, get clicking.
