{"id":293143,"date":"2019-02-04T06:04:52","date_gmt":"2019-02-03T20:04:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/?p=293143"},"modified":"2019-02-04T06:04:52","modified_gmt":"2019-02-03T20:04:52","slug":"aleksenko-heath-excel-in-pre-tagaman-races","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/aleksenko-heath-excel-in-pre-tagaman-races\/","title":{"rendered":"Aleksenko, Heath excel in pre-Tagaman races"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id='gallery-1' class='gallery galleryid-293143 gallery-columns-3 gallery-size-thumbnail'><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/aleksenko-heath-excel-in-pre-tagaman-races\/tagamanpix2-2\/'>tagamanpix2<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-293145'>\n\t\t\t\tTriathlon Association of the CNMI officers pose for a photo with staff members and officials of Kanoa Resort, the official host hotel of the 2019 Tagaman Triathlon. (Contributed Photo)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure><figure class='gallery-item'>\n\t\t\t<div class='gallery-icon '>\n\t\t\t\t<a href='https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/aleksenko-heath-excel-in-pre-tagaman-races\/tagamanpix-14\/'>tagamanpix<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<figcaption class='wp-caption-text gallery-caption' id='gallery-1-293144'>\n\t\t\t\tIsaiah Aleksenko heads to the swim-run transition area at Kilili Beach during last Saturday\u2019s 4th IT&amp;E Saipan Aquathlon and 10K Pathway Run. (Roby N. Pamintuan)\n\t\t\t\t<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\n<p>Isaiah Aleksenko and Kaylee Heath gained top honors in the 4th IT&amp;E Saipan Aquathlon and 10K Pathway Run last Saturday.<\/p>\n<p>Aleksenko braved the waves in the waters off Kilili Beach and kept a steady pace in the run race along Beach Road to finish ahead of the field with a time of 44:28.7. Right after crossing the finish line at Kilili Beach, the 13-year-old member of Swimming Center Tsunami Saipan was visibly delighted.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt felt good, really good,\u201d Aleksenko,\u201d he said. \u201cBefore the race, I stretched, warmed up, and tried my best to get motivated.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Jinnosuke Suzuki and Carlo Canepa rounded out the Top 3 in the male with the former clocking in at 45:39.1 and the latter submitting 45:57.9. In the women\u2019s division, Emily Northrop (46:05), Heather Taylor (46:51.2), and Sarah Vander Wal (47:52.0) made it to the podium. The aquathlon featured two 2.5K run races from Kilili Beach and back with a turnaround point across the former Saipan Mayor\u2019s Office in Beach Road and a 1K swim at Kilili Beach<\/p>\n<p>In the 10K race held simultaneously with the aquathlon, Kaylee Heath (41:02.8) secured the first place overall by using a \u201cnegative split\u201d strategy, which means that she planned on finishing the second half of the race with a faster time than the first. The 10K course had runners turning around at the Chamolinian Utt in Garapan to head back to the start\/finish line.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI don\u2019t have a pacing watch, so my strategy was just to try to run negative splits, which means that I wanted to go out a little bit slower than heading back. I was able to do that, and I did that based on how I was feeling,\u201d Heath said.<\/p>\n<p>The 26-year old Heath moved to Saipan from Washington with her husband and two kids two and a half months ago, which was right after Typhoon Yutu ransacked the island. Because of the typhoon\u2019s damaging effects and the demanding schedule of raising two children, she has not been able to train or compete in races as often as she used to. Despite these hurdles, Heath was still able to enjoy the thrill of the event and outperformed her rivals.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIt felt super fun. I haven\u2019t raced in a while because I have two kids. Since I\u2019ve had them, I\u2019ve been really off and on with being able to race, but I\u2019m finally starting to find my groove a little bit,\u201d Heath said. \u201cIt was super fun.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Joining Heath in the Top 3 in the women\u2019s division were Ayano Braxton (48:10.0) and Sakiko Eda (49:07.0). In the men\u2019s category, Kosuke Sato (41:58.8), Ronald Villafria (44:32.1), and Jay Zhang (45:43.4) were ranked 1-2-3.<\/p>\n<p>Last weekend\u2019s race was organized by the Triathlon Association of the CNMI and although TRAC was anticipating to host just 50 participants, 72 competitors showed up on race day<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI feel elated for having exceeded expectations,\u201d TRAC president Ricky Castro said. \u201cIt shows that there is a strong support for multisport [competition] in this small community. We saw a batch of first-timers in triathlon and repeat participants as well.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The 4th IT&amp;E Saipan Aquathlon &amp; 10K Pathway Run was one of the pre-races for the 2019 Tagaman Triathlon, which will be taking place on Mar. 30. This year\u2019s Tagaman Triathlon is particularly eventful, as it marks the 30th anniversary of the iconic race.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe race series will help the competitors get familiarized with the swim, bike, and run courses,\u201d Castro said, adding that the series will help the athletes get first-hand experience with triathlon\u2019s transitions.<\/p>\n<p>Both Aleksenko and Heath will be competing in next month\u2019s Tagaman.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMy next race is the Tagaman Triathlon. I\u2019m feeling good and nervous at the same time,\u201d Aleksenko said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThere\u2019s a big triathlon at the end of March. I\u2019m on a team, and I\u2019m doing the 10K running part of that,\u201d Heath said.<\/p>\n<p>Meanwhile, last Saturday\u2019s event was sponsored by Kanoa Resort, which is also the host hotel for this year\u2019s Tagaman, IT&amp;E, Powerade, and Let\u2019s Go Tours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Isaiah Aleksenko and Kaylee Heath gained top honors in the 4th IT&amp;E Saipan Aquathlon and&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":293144,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-293143","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293143","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=293143"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/293143\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/293144"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=293143"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=293143"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.saipantribune.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=293143"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}