French Connection Dominates Men's Race

There was a French connection at the top of the men’s podium at RBC Super League Jersey 2019 as Vincent Luis and Pierre Le Corre blew away the rest of the field.

With weather conditions meaning there was no bike leg, but having improved sufficiently since the women’s race to have four continuous swim-runs, Luis and Le Corre started hard and asserted their dominance.

They swam and ran together throughout but it was always Luis in control and with the advantage of the Short Chute the defending champion broke away on the final run lap to win by five seconds.

Hayden Wilde, who like Luis came into the race on the back of winning his group in the Semi-Final, came in third. Ben Kanute outsprinted another Frenchman, Leo Bergere, for fourth.

Luis took maximum points to kick-off the 2019/20 Championship Series and picked up $20,000 for his efforts.

Luis said:

It was good fun. We tried to help each other. Pierre had a chat with me and told me ‘you are too strong for me and I just try to stick with you as long as I can’. We just made our way off the front pretty quickly and then we just had to control Hayden off the front. We just wanted to bring the pink jersey back to France. Pierre and me were the same and we just want the pink jersey on some French shoulders and with Cassandre on the women’s side it was good to have both men and women. By the end I knew I had the short chute and I can push hard and take it at the end.

Le Corre admitted he knew he couldn’t beat Luis on the day but was delighted to come second.

Le Corre said:

I never thought I am going to beat Vincent. Already on the run I told Vincent ‘I was not going to let you win but obviously you are better than me today’ and he had the Short Chute so I knew I was not going to be five or ten seconds better than him on the last lap so my job was to stay on his feet as long as possible. It’s great for me because Vincent is the World Champion and to stay on his feet all the way through is important for me.

It was a good weekend for Wilde and the ‘Maltese Falcon’ was clearly ecstatic with his third place

Wilde said:

I’m absolutely stoked. I came in here with an open mind. The bike was gone and I had the green jersey for the reason of biking so to have four good legs in the swim and come in third I am stoked. It was unexpected especially having just the run and the swim. I knew the run form was there and I had to push hard and every time I pushed further I knew I would get a bigger gap and a bigger gap is better for me in the water. On the last one I was getting really tired. I’m stoked to come home with a third place.