News

Wales' Liam Lloyd 4th at ETU Altafulla

Published:

Yesterday Welsh athlete Liam Lloyd raced the Altafulla ETU Continental Cup, placing 4th.

Yesterday Welsh athlete Liam Lloyd raced the Altafulla ETU Continental Cup, placing 4th. The Altafulla ETU Continental Cup was a sprint distance (750m swim, 20km bike, 5km run),  featuring a beach start into the Mediterranean Sea and a technical bike course taking athletes up a long climb through narrow Spanish streets. 

 

Wales' interests lay with Llanelli's Liam Lloyd, who lined up at the start wearing number 12. Recovering quickly from a stumble on the start line, Liam found himself right amongst the action in the swim. Fellow British athlete Nathan Tweedie led out the swim with Liam exiting the water with a large group of athletes. Liam had a good bike, working his way through the field of athletes to enter T1 with the main front group. 

 

Liam said: "I stayed towards the front to keep myself out of trouble going around the technical bits, with a few crashes happening at the back of the pack. At the end of the bike I made sure I was at the front to get into T2. Unfortunately Nathan Tweedie, fellow British Athlete slipped on a sandy corner bringing his race to an end after leading the swim out in his first ETU cup of the year."

 

Exiting T2 in third place, Liam soon found his running legs. Around 1km into the run leg race winner Simon De Cuyper (BEL) and second place Francesc Godoy (BEL) had opened up a gap from Liam. Posting a blazing 15.39 run split, Liam found himself in a battle for third place with French athlete Felix Duchamp. Despite running together, then opening up a gap, Felix Duchamp (FRA) was able to catch and pull away from Liam. 

 

Liam said: "Felix was able to close the gap to me, he put a surge in when I was hurting to open up a gap."

 

With a clear gap to 5th place Liam ran strongly to finish 4th overall, his best ever finishing position in a Senior Continental Cup. 

 

Liam concluded: "I was really happy to have a great race that will motivate me in the races I have coming up, this includes trying to emulate last year's performance at London Triathlon (where I finished 2nd and 1st GB winning the British Championships) and then Liverpool Tri (where last year I was runner-up of the British Sprint Championships and placed 4th overall)." 

 

Men's Podium - Simon De Cuyper (BEL), Francesc Godoy (BEL), Felix Duchamp (FRA)

Women's Podium - Charlotte Deldaele (BEL), Sara Perez Sala (ESP), Marta Sanchez (ESP) 

 

Full results can be found here

 

Article by: Kieran John 

Thanks to our Partners

Join Us

And enjoy insurance benefits, race licensing and more...