Shannon Edgar took control on the cycling leg to give the Columba College senior girls team a comfortable win in the Otago secondary schools duathlon championships at North Taieri yesterday.
The Columba College team of Edgar and Laura Carruthers won the 4km run, 16km cycle and 2km run event in 52min 43sec from Anna Kean and Katrina Andrew (Otago Girls'), 54min 12sec, and Sian English and Laura Bridger (Columba B), 55min 10sec.
Edgar (17) broke her right foot when running up Goats Pass on the Speight's Coast to Coast in February and has not been able to run since then.
But she has kept up her fitness on the bike and last month was a member of the Columba senior girls team that won a bronze medal in the New Zealand secondary schools triathlon championships in Queenstown.
Carruthers, who was also a member of that team, ran the first 4km running leg for Columba College and finished 30m behind Kean (Otago Girls') who was the fastest senior girls runner in the event.
Edgar passed Andrew, the Otago Girls' cyclist, and increased Columba's margin on the three laps of the 16km cycling leg.
Carruthers was out of sight when Kean started the last 2km running leg and comfortably won the event for Columba.
Columba College dominated the girls teams events with Charlotte Cahill and Georgie Wood winning the intermediate girls race in 36min 58sec and Hannah English and Jodie Llewellyn the junior girls event in 38min 28sec.
The senior girls individual title was won easily by Mary Grey (Otago Girls') in 56min 7sec from Nadia McDonnell (Tokomairiro), 59min 6sec, and Caitlin Dent (South Otago), 59min 43sec.
Grey (16), who won the New Zealand girls under-19 mountain bike cross-country title in Dunedin in February, took control on the cycling leg.
The senior boys title was won by Andrew Harper (King's) in 52min 31sec from Toby Batchelor (John McGlashan), 54min 25sec, and Connor Anderson (John McGlashan), 55min 20sec.
Batchelor led on the first 4km run and was 250m in front of Harper before the cycling leg.
Harper showed his skills on the bike and had caught Batchelor halfway through the first of the three cycling laps and continued to increase his winning margin.
The Taieri College team of Jared Casey (run) and Denton Hayward (cycling) led from the start to win the senior boys teams race in 50min 3sec from Bennett Jones and Adam Macdonald (John McGlashan), 56min 37sec, and Hayden Mitchell (King's), 58min 41sec.
The other winners of the individual events were Hamish McKay (Dunstan), junior boys (38min 12sec); Ben Wardaugh (Otago Boys), intermediate boys (36min 47sec); Shannon Hope (Bayfield), junior girls (40min 42sec); Georgia Vessy (Dunstan), intermediate girls (39min 11sec).
