Villacrusis, Brennfleck take 1st triathlon qualifier

The long-awaited Pacific Games qualifier for the Triathlon Association of the CNMI finally went through on Sunday, Oct. 25 at PauPau Beach.

Even with the qualifier being pushed back a few months due to the weather, the rain made itself known as it poured sporadically throughout the event that featured a 750m swim, 20km bike, and 5k run. Despite the rough currents and slippery roads, Christian Villacrusis and Shawna Brennfleck made it work and came in first in their divisions.

The goal of the qualifier is to choose the top three triathletes in the women’s and men’s division, along with an alternate for each for a total of eight athletes. Another qualifier is set for Dec. 6, 6:30am, also at PauPau Beach.

This first qualifier, Villacrusis clocked in at 1:17:18, with James Munnis in second place at 1:30:12, and Evan Seguritan in third at 1:36:46.

For Villacrusis, he said that the weather made the course tough. “The weather made it really hard for us on the swim and also on the bike. As soon as I got out, it started pouring so hard. I was just like ‘I got to finish this race’.” He added, “This is probably the hardest it’s ever been even though we’ve been doing the same course over and over again, so it’s a nice change of pace I think, to be a little bit challenged, and it’ll help us prepare for the next selections coming up.”

In the women’s division, Brennfleck finished with a time of 1:23:03, Denise Myers was second at 1:29:48, and third went to Kimberly Spence-Jensen with 1:30:12.

Brennfleck, for her part, said, “It was tough coming out of the water. Like Christian said, it was raining on the run—I had to slow down a little bit because it actually felt pretty windy and slippery, but I think we both finished strong for the conditions.”

Recapping their time in Tahiti for the 3rd World Triathlon Development Cup in August, Villacrusis said, “Tahiti was amazing. I’m glad that I got to go over the course and I’m excited to share what we’ve learned with our future teammates. We haven’t been training as a team just yet because we haven’t selected any members, but hopefully we’ll be able to do that soon.”

The course that they competed on is the same course for the Games and Brennfleck said that it’s not such a difficult course. Villacrusis added that the swim is probably the hardest discipline there, while the bike and run course is super flat.

Once the team for Tahiti is selected, Brennfleck said they’ll have once or twice a week practices.

Robyn Spaeth, president of TRAC, said that it was great to get the qualifiers going. “It’s great to have people out here. There’s a lot of younger kids that have come out today too, so that’s great to see. So yeah, really excited for the season.”