Just two weeks after her victory at WTCS Hamburg, Cassandre Beaugrand takes another big win: she was just the strongest at WTCS Sunderland. The Frenchwoman thus lived up to her favorite role.
It was pretty surprising that South African Vicky van der Merwe was the first to come out of the North Sea: after 9:16 minutes she had completed her 750 meters swim and a full field of professional athletes followed within a minute
The race wasn't that exciting on the bike; a leading group of seven women emerged - Therese Freusinger, Emma Lombardi, Olivia Mathias, Cassandre Beaugrand, Annika Koch, Vittoria Lopes and Lizeth Rueda Santos - but nothing special happend. A large group followed at twenty seconds almost the entire bike ride, until the last kilometers, when they caught up with the leading group. Once in T2, a huge leading group of almost 30 women started the run together. It was Lombardi who had the fastest transition, but Beaugrand came alongside after a few hundred meters already, to take the lead in the race. Lombardi was able to follow almost 3km, but in the closing stage she had to let Beaugrand go.
Beaugrand won the race in 59:53. Lombardi finished second at 19 seconds and Koch third at 24 seconds. It was Koch's first WTCS podium.
