Flora Duffy Makes it Back-to-Back WTS Victories

Earning her fourth career World Triathlon Series victory and second consecutive win of the season, Flora Duffy (BER) claimed the 2017 Columbia Threadneedle World Triathlon Leeds in a near-perfect race scenario.

Exiting the waters among the leaders and then joining a small and fierce lead bike pack that worked well together to earn a large advantage, Duffy entered the run with a clear shot of earning the day’s gold medal. Giving her a second WTS win of the season and a trade up from the silver medal she earned in Leeds in 2016, Duffy’s victory also puts her in a solid position to continue her quest of reclaiming her world title.

Joining the reigning world champion on the podium was two WTS medal first-timers: Taylor Spivey (USA) and Alice Betto (ITA). Spivey earned the silver medal, advancing from her first-time silver medal she earned in Madrid in the World Cup circuit only a few weeks before in order to become the seventh woman in the USA to make a WTS podium.

Duffy said of how the race played out, “I came out of the water in a good position and luckily the girls on the bike were keen to work with me. So perhaps they picked up on if you ride hard there is an opportunity to podium, so we made a huge gap and yeah it was fantastic. You know this was Taylor’s (Spivey) first podium and Alice’s (Betto) as well, so that is really cool and I am super happy for them.”

Read the complete recap at Triathlon.org and watch a video recap below.