Major League Tri Atlantic City Race Report

Event - Major League Tri Atlantic City Round 1

21.07.18
12.15pm start Elite Teams

Gold Coast Tritons Team

Super Sprint Relay

Very rough beach start & 300m + Ocean swim, 5km boardwalk ride, 1 mile flat run with 50% soft sand running.

Weather

Very testing conditions; super windy, Rain & storms!

Result

Took 2nd with the team!

Fastest individual female split of the day for me!

My last continent hop of this racing block overseas, started in Asia, onto Europe & now to North America for 3 weekends of racing fun!! First up was the start of the Major League Triathlon (MLT) 2018 Series, of with Australia has its first ever team entered as the Gold Coast Tritons. MLT runs as a super sprint team relay format, so usually around the 300m run, 6km ride & 1.6km mil run, in teams of 4 with 2 men & women each doing their super sprint leg & tagging off to the next. Like Superleague, MLT is a game changer too, mixing it up with changes in order, as some races in the series the Men will actually be with 1st & 3rd leg & the women will play the 2nd & 4th anchor leg, as well as dishing up some exciting & challenging courses!

Atlantic City, race 1 in New Jersey did not disappoint, it sure had it all. With a strong storm cell predicted to hit Saturday early afternoon the race was pushed forward as organisers & athletes were worried about riding on a wet Atlantic City wooden boardwalk promenade, because that wood gets wet it can turn slick as ice! The storm cell & VERY strong onshore winds had brought in some decent swell too, with quite big waves and testing ocean conditions, and with a lot of soft sand running involoved in the race, both up from the swim but on each of the 4 laps of the run it was going to be tough for all & a great test on the teams!

Having grown up racing in the surf & on the sand I was pumped, just the conditions I thrive in. Jaz Hedgeland started our team relay off for the Gold Coast Tritons & with a great swim/ ride the majority of the field were still close & in the mix early, the sand sorted the girls out though & Ryan Fisher started leg 2 for us in 5th, around 50 seconds down. Fisher had a strong swim, bike & run to pull back some decent time allowing me to start leg 3 for the team just around 40 secs down from the leading San Diego Team, & also chasing down the Carolina Gliders in 2nd. Putting my surf experience to good use I was first to the buoy and caught a wave of chop into shore to ste myself up with an early lead here of 25 seconds, pushing hard up the soft sand dune run into transition 1 to keep the pressure on the chasing girls! The rain was starting to come down & I knew with the big World Series race of Edmonton next weekend I couldn’t afford to come down on the slippery wooden boardwalk, working hard on the bike on the straights where it was low risk & playing it safe on the 2 hotdog bends at each end of the 5 laps. Pleased to see my lead was extending to the chasers each lap, heading out onto the cross country style all terrain run, what a fun course, but gosh you just feel like youre not moving in that soft sand n matter how hard you try. The crowd on course was awesome & fuelled me on to keep pushing out that lead & by the tag to Brandon in 4th as our last leg we had pulled away a 50 sec lead over the rest of the race!

The rain really started coming down for the men’s last leg & although Brandon swam well & was out on the bike with our contenders, the Carolina Team, the slippery Boardwalk played havoc for many of the athletes & Brandon unfortunately was one of them, to his credit, he got straight up & fought on very well! Pulling back chunks of time on the run leg but it just wasn’t enough to catch the Carolina Gliders team who took the MLT Race 1 Atlantic City Line honours! With San Diego rounding out the podium!

We’ll be back for redemption in Vail & I know I can speak for the whole team is saying were super motivated & don’t want to see those USA athletes getting two up on us!

Straight out of Atlantic city I was lucky enough to head Nth to New York City for a rare Sunday afternoon off to relax, “actively recover” & explore the ultimate girls bucket list city tick off! What a day that was wondering around Times Square, Central Park, Brooklyn & Manhattan on 2 feet & 2 wheels! Monday I was straight back into it, flying from JFK NYC to Seattle, from one coast of the United States to the other & then onto Edmonton, Canada.

With the second MLT race of the series coming up after Edmonton WTS in 2 weeks in Vail Colorado at 2500m up in the clouds I’m sure it will prove just as challenging come race day, and I cant wait, just the way l like it!

Emma Jeffcoat24 July 2018atlantic city