Duathlon -- Parish and Kattouf Take 2012 National Duathlon Titles

ORO VALLEY, Ariz. – Patrick Parish and Gail Kattouf clinched overall national titles in the standard-distance event, while Greg McNeil and Patty Peoples won the sprint-distance race Saturday at USA Triathlon’s 2012 Duathlon National Championship, presented by TriSports.com.

Patty Peoples wins 2012 Sprint Duathlon Championship (Dave Sanders, USAT)

Parish (Bloomington, Minn.) was the top U.S. finisher on the 5-kilometer run, 35-kilometer bike, 5-kilometer run course with a time of 1:23:06. He finished 12 seconds behind overall winner Lionel Sanders of Ontario, Canada, who clocked in at 1:22:54. Matthew Payne (Columbia Heights, Minn.) was third in 1:25:42, and last year’s overall champion Dave Slavinski logged a time of 1:25:50 to finish fourth overall and round out the national championship podium.

“I knew a few people would take it out hard,” said Parish, who ran at Duke University in college. “I just wanted to relax through the first run, and catch everybody on the bike and see if I could close.” Parish also claimed the 25-29 age group title and posted a 49:03 bike split, which was the fastest bike split of the day in the standard-distance event.

Defending champion Kattouf (Greenville, S.C.) bested the women’s field by nearly three minutes, taking the tape with a time of 1:37:00. She led the women’s field after the first run, with a 5k split of 19:02.

“Today I left it all out on the course,” Kattouf said. “I was really pleased with how the race went down. I knew going into transition I had a couple minutes lead, and then I cruised on the run.” In addition to her 2011 national title, Kattouf won a world title and plans to defend later this year in Nancy, France.

To continue reading and for results, click here.

About these ads