CHOBIE Dueñas of Volvo Multisports and Louie Villacin of WS Tri Team ruled the fifth year of the Tabuelan 111 Triathlon as they walked away with the overall title in the men’s and women’s full distance category at the Maravilla Beach in Tabuelan, Cebu yesterday.
It was only the fourth triathtlon race for Dueñas and his longest distance so far since doing the sport. He clocked 4 hours 46 minutes and 45 seconds in the 2-kilometer swim, 88K bike and 21K run race to ink his first overall podium finish on his triathlon career.
Dueñas, the younger brother of coach and triathtlete John Philip, said he was not expecting to win this event. He was trailing after clocking 42:28 in the swim portion and was also playing catch up in the majority of the bike segment.
“I only got the lead in the last loop of the bike segment. I was able to widen the gap a bit in the run segment,” said Dueñas, a runner and duathlete who started triathlon this year.
The 20-year-old Dueñas timed 2:31:42 in the bike portion and 1:32:35 in the run part.
Christopher Rodriguez took the men’s overall second place with 5:10:26 while Eljan Pelegrino salvaged third place in 5:17:01.
Louie Villacin snagged the full distance overall title in the distaff side with a time of 5:55:26. Cianyl Jamae Gonzalez of Rider Omega Pro Tri Team came second in 6:01:41 and June-Marq Ocana was third with 6:19:36.
Gonzalez was the first woman to come out of the water at 38:25 and was leading on the first phase of the bike segment.
Villacin took the lead in the second loop of the bike and finished the 88K course in 2:59:15 while Gonzalez had 3:10:31.
Villacin never looked back after that and completed the run in 2:12:36 to win her first full distance overall title.
Villacin, who was a two-time half distance champion in the event, decided to join the long distance for her preparation in the Ironman 70.3 Asia-Pacific Championships which is set on Aug. 7 in Cebu.
Villacin said that she has put a little bit of change on her training for Ironman this year by doing a long distance race.
She said she will be joining the Sogod 8080 Triathlon before Ironman 70.3 Asia-Pacific Championships.
The winners in the half distance which had 1K swim, 44K bike and 10.5K run were Alton Lorenzo Amor (2:31:16) of Rider Omega Pro in the men’s 18-24, Lex Diaz (2:29:21) of Autofocus Tri Team in the men’s 25-29, Noel Tillor (2:29:57) of TEC-Patt’s Tri in the men’s 30-34, Jefrey Codino Cola (2:28:06) of Rider Omega Pro in men’s 35-39, Randy Gilles (2:43:35) in men’s 40-44, Leonardo Angeles Jr. (2:39:19) in the men’s 45-49 and Jerome Chua (2:36:19) of YYKredit Inc in the men’s 50-above.
The winners in the distaff side were Team Hait’s Tiffany Quijada (3:00:37) in women’s 18-29, Zenia Mai Enriquez Go (3:11:57) in women’s 30-39 and Nanhee Kim (3:03:02) in women’s 40-above.