La Presse in Tokyo | Honor saved from a disappointed team

(Tokyo) A disappointing exit for the Canadian national team.

First note: The new Olympic mixed triathlon event is amazing.

Second note: If the first of your team gets stuck in traffic at the buoy, good luck getting back into the race.

It happened to Joanna Brown. After the two (still unexplained) holes she took out in Tuesday’s women’s triathlon, this time, something went wrong while swimming.

So the Canadian team was 14 years old^NS Out of 16 in the first mission. The added difficulty comes from the fact that being alone behind you, is left to yourself to ride. As you progress, small factions can save themselves by working together.

The gap widened with relay Alexis LePage, who was chosen this week as a replacement for the strongest Canadian, Tyler Mslauchuk, who has a tendon injury.

“I wasn’t necessarily in good shape, and I burned out all the cartridges to catch up with the peloton, which was probably 15 seconds ahead,” said LePage, who has put a lot of effort into swimming, his specialty. “I saw them 50 meters away, but I gave it all up too early…”

When he was racing, he ran out of juice.

It was Amelie Kretz who practically saved the honor by overtaking the Mexican, avoiding last place in Canada. Matt Sharp retained this position.

Everyone was trying to show a relatively good mood, but not to mention the podium, the team in principle is better from second to last place. We can see Amelie Kretz console Joanna Brown, who had another “hard day” for her.

“It’s a very nice opportunity to take part in an Olympic triathlon,” said Lepage, 27, of Gatineau.

“You also have to be lucky in the triathlon, where the relay lines up really well,” Kretz said.

They weren’t so lucky.

It must be said that this team went over the limit in order to get their ticket to Tokyo.

It was Amelie who qualified the Canadian relay to qualify individually.

“The race mirrors the last few weeks pretty well. We fought to be here, we just fought to stay in the race…”

Québécoise returns home for the first time in seven months. You’ll be in the Montreal Triathlon, then the World in Edmonton. She already has an eye “definitely” on Paris 2024, and given her progress, we should focus on her.

In total, he leaves the Canadian team with results well below his expectations.

Gold went to Great Britain, silver went to the United States, and bronze went to France, perhaps the best, as it moved up from fifth to third.

It was exactly the birthday of the French Leonie Perrault. She will have several reasons to celebrate, the one who was first disqualified by her federation and qualified in the most extreme cases. Right after qualifying, she felt pain in her stomach… and had an appendicitis operation.

A medal, an anniversary, and a successful run, this is another great singles triathlon, right?