Knechts dominate TRYathlon

Lucas and R.J. Knecht made last Saturday’s Kids TRYathlon up at Marpi a family affair after the two dominated their respective age groups.

Lucas was first to cross the tape in the 10-12-year-old division, finishing the 200-meter swim, 6-kilometer bike, and 2-kilometer run course in a sterling time of 30:51.

After coming out of the water second best (3:19), Lucas made up for lost time by pedaling like there was no tomorrow in the bike portion (15:07). He then had the rest of the participants bite the dust with an excellent run split (12:25).

Sarah Johnson finished second in the age group and first among the girls after clocking in at 33:14. She was first out of the water (3:14) but was eventually overtaken by Lucas in the bike (17:04) and the run (12:56) segments of the race.

Cooper Graf finished second among the boys and third overall. His time of 33:54 was built on a swim of 3:19, a bike split of 13:10, and a run of 13:10.

Bradley Brostrom had the fourth best time among 10-12-year-olds and third among the boys. His swim, bike, and run splits of 4:50, 17:14, and 13:55 gave him an overall time of 35:59.

Emma McCullough-Stearns (39:33) and Madison Schultz (46:21) came in fifth and sixth best in the age group and second and third for the girls.

McCullough-Stearns had a 4:01 swim, an 18:56 bike, and a 16:36 run. Schultz, for her part, had splits of 6:42 (swim), 24:32 (swim), and 15:07 (run).

The Kids TRYathlon only had two participants in 13-14 age group. Amanda Johnson came in first with a time of 32:31 (2:58 swim, 16:17 bike, and 13:16 run), while Katy Johnson was second reaching the finish line in 34:05 (3:35, 18:17, and 12:13).

R.J., meanwhile, duplicated his older brother’s feat by ruling the 8-9-year-old division despite only topping the bike split (9:22) of the 100-meter, 3-kilometer, and 1-kilometer triathlon.

The strength of his performance in the bike, coupled with hairline runner-up finishes in the swim (1:39) and run (5:33) segments, proved enough for R.J. to win the race in an overall time of 16:34.

Ilia Corella, who was the first girl to cross the finish line, won the swim (1:35) and run (5:30) splits but was just too way behind in the bike (10:12) and settled for second best with a time of 17:17.

Clay McCullough-Stearns (1:56 swim, 9:16 bike, 6:18 run and 17:30 overall) and Ashley Northern (2:06, 10:26, 6:24, and 18:56) came in second among the boys and girls, respectively.

Third place in the girls went to Dominique Austin (2:01, 11:29, 6:15, and 19:45), while Cody Race (3:08, 9:57, 9:36 and 22:41) finished third best for the boys.

In the 6-7-year-old category, Jacob Jones and Andrew Johnson finished tied in first place with an overall time of 19:31. Johnson got the better of Jones in the swim split (2:11 to 3:13) but the latter came back with an excellent performance on the bike (9:14 to 10:19) to take pole position. Johnson was only able to force a tie after finishing 3 seconds ahead of Jones in the run (7:04 to 7:01).

The first girl to reach the finish line was Opal Northern, who negotiated the course in 28:22. She swam in a time of 3:18, finished the bike in 13:47, and did the run split in 11:17.

Jack Sharer (2:22, 11:12, 7:18, and 20:52) and Quintin Ramsey (3:12, 12:22, 8:42, and 24:16), finished second and third for the boys, respectively, while Taylor Knecht bagged second for the girls (5:02, 19:30, 13:49, and 38:21).

Event coordinator Betty Johnson was ecstatic about the turnout and the result of the Kids TRYathlon.

“We had best turnout ever in last Saturday’s Kids TRYathlon with 35 participants. Most did the entire course and a few opted to do a portion of the course. And we had a couple of teams. Basically, the 6-9 year olds did the same distance, but the age group for winners was broken into ages 6-7 boys and girls, and ages 8-9 boys and girls. We did the same in longer distance for the 10-14-year-olds,” she said.