Foreign men showed their American counterparts how to win triathlons Sunday by taking the first seven places in the 2000 St. Croix International Triathlon. American females fared better, winning first and third places in the women's division.
By the time last year's winner, Jimmy Riccitello of Arizona, crossed the finish line in Christiansted Sunday morning, triathletes from Belgium, Argentina, Denmark, New Zealand and Canada were already cooling down after swimming, cycling and running under a blazing sun.
First place and a prize of $7,000 went to Belgium's Luc Van Lierde in his initial St. Croix appearance. Van Lierde, winner of the 1999 Hawaii Ironman, finished in 2 hours, 31 minutes and 39 seconds, 1 minute and 36 seconds more than the St. Croix record of 2:30:03 set in 1995 by Australia's Greg Welch.
Argentina's Oscar Galindez won $4,500 for finishing second, Denmark's Peter Sandvang finished third for $3,250, New Zealand's Peter Clode was fourth for $2,200, his fellow New Zealander Cameron Brown was fifth for $1,500, Canada's Jamie Cleveland was sixth for $1,350, and Denmark's Allan Mansson was seventh for $1,250.
Then, and only then, came Riccitello, who had beaten everyone else for the past two years in St. Croix.
Among the women, with the same allocation of prize money, Joanna Zeiger, a Ph.D. candidate at Johns Hopkins University in Maryland, narrowly beat Canada's Carol Montgomery to the finish line. Zeiger's time was 2:53:44, almost 10 minutes short of the record.
Defending champion Karen Smyers of Massachusetts was third, Susanne Nielson of Denmark fourth, and Lisa Bentley of Canada fifth.
Among the many local men competing was The Source's own Jamie Bate, who, in his first attempt at a full-length triathlon, predicted that his time would be close to four hours. Bate crossed the finish line at the fort in Christiansted as the electronic timer showed 3 hours and 59 minutes.
All the contestants swam 2 kilometers (1.2 miles), biked 55 kilometers (35 miles) and ran 12 kilometers (7.4 miles).
