Story and photos by Don Urquhart, Times Chronicle
Nearly 1,000 athletes from age 15 to 80+ took part in the Oliver Sprint/Standard Triathlon on the weekend highlighted by a Half Iron event on Sunday (June 2) with the course stretching as far as Willowbrook.
This year’s winner, Joaquin Pereda Charles from Mexico, turned in a time of just over four hours, 10 minutes for the course, followed by Nick Thomas from Vancouver and Kevin Ahl from Nelson, with times of four hours, 14 minutes and four hours, 18 minutes respectively.
Organized by Dynamic Race Events, Saturday featured a Sprint comprised of a 750 m swim, 17 km bike and 5 km run while Sunday saw the Half Iron comprised of a 1,500 m swim, 40 km bike and 10 km run. Sunday also featured a team relay race.
This year’s winner, Joaquin Pereda Charles from Mexico (centre), turned in a time of just over four hours, 10 minutes for the course, followed by Nick Thomas from Vancouver (left) and Kevin Ahl from Nelson (right), with times of four hours, 14 minutes and four hours, 18 minutes respectively.
Angie Woodhead, Owner/ Organizer of Dynamic Race Events said the event, which has been running for 19 years (Woodhead has been involved since 2015), went smoothly again this year in large part due to the large number of volunteers who support the event.
“Oliver is great, it’s always super welcoming, super supportive – all the volunteer groups who come back each year to help.”
When asked about the course that weaves its way around the scenic roads of the South Okanagan from the start at Tuc-el-Nuit Lake to the roads of Oliver, Black Sage Road and up a grueling climb to Fairview and then Willowbrook and back, Woodhead says “you’re pretty much guaranteed a negative split.” She explains that the hard climb is slow but on the return racers are “screaming back downhill” which means a much shorter time.
Most of the participants are from the Pacific Northwest, she says, but there is also a very strong contingent from Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba, she says adding that “we always get reach out from a few athletes who are kind of traveling around and doing other a races that may come to this as a sort of training race.”
“This year there were a lot of first timers, which is really great to see. The nice thing about Oliver is because we do it over two days, a lot of the tri clubs will come out and they bring some of their newer athletes on the Saturday to race the shoulder course.
“And then on Sunday, the more experienced athletes take on the longer course and then the next year we see those beginners move on to phase two.
“We also host this fun little race that’s happening within the race,” she says referring to the Mixed Team Relay which isn’t very common she adds.
Woodhead says the season kicks off on Mother’s Day weekend in May at Westwood Lake in Nanaimo before two days in Oliver followed by Elk Lake in August and capping the season off at Cultus Lake in September.
