Triathlete Ashleigh Gentle will be vying for her eighth Noosa Triathlon win when she lines up against a 14-strong women’s elite field on Sunday.
The 30-year-old is preparing for her first hit-out since the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in July.
“My preparation’s been going well, but to be honest it was a bit of a slow start after my two weeks in quarantine in the Northern Territory,” Ashleigh said. Like so many other triathletes the Noosa Triathlon, now in its 38th year, is an annual pilgrimage for Gentle, and a highlight on the calendar.
“Each Noosa to me has been unique. I feel like that familiarity of Noosa Tri is something that is always nice,” Ashleigh said. “I love it so much and it always helps me find motivation no matter how my year has gone beforehand, so I really like that about it.
“It’s really easy to be motivated for Noosa to be honest, because you kind of just remember the good times and everything that Noosa stands for,” she said. “Winning in Noosa is great and I’ve absolutely loved how successful I’ve been but I just love how the community comes together there and there’s a Noosa Tri family. It’s really great to be able to be a part of it and be racing, obviously in the Elite race but also with thousands of other athletes which is something I don’t do very often being on the World Series circuit.”
Joining Gentle on the start line will be Lotte Wilms, an Australian based Dutch athlete who won IRONMAN 70.3 Sunshine Coast last month, an impressive result on her IRONMAN 70.3 debut.
Also set to race in Noosa is Kirra Seidel who finished second at this year’s IRONMAN 70.3 Sunshine Coast.
Athletes will race across a 1.5km swim, 40km ride and 10km run, joining around 6,000 other triathletes out on course.
In 2021 the Noosa Triathlon men’s race will have a first-time winner, with none of the 28 male elite athletes having stood on the top step of the podium at the event.
Brisbane’s Ryan Fisher is looking forward to heading north to Noosa, after injury and travel restrictions kept him close to home this year.
“I’ve had a bit of slow season, I had an injury just before I was meant to go overseas a while back so it was a little bit hard for a while there finding motivation and getting back with limited racing,” Ryan said. “Once we got through the later stages of the year and with Noosa going ahead it made it a lot easier to get out the door.
“It’s one of those races, and I may be biased being from Queensland, it’s probably the biggest and most enjoyable race that we have in Australia, I think that is pretty widely agreed upon, and I think with it being at the end of the year people are going onto a break after which gives it that extra bit of enjoyment.”
Fisher has finished on the podium at Noosa Triathlon three times and knows that everyone in the field is a threat on race day.
“It’s one of those races where you can’t write off anybody anyway, the amount of times you hear of people talking about different athletes and who’s more likely to do well, there’s always someone who comes up out of the blue.
I’ve finished second there twice and third once and then the last two years I’ve been fourth and fifth, I’m pretty confident that I’m in good shape at the moment and it will be nice to get back on it.”
Fisher will be joined at the event by athletes who have excelled at all distances of the sport, both at home and abroad.
Max Neumann was second at the event in 2018, and since then has successfully made the transition to IRONMAN events, having won the last two Cairns Airport Asia Pacific Championship IRONMAN Cairns races.
This year’s Noosa Triathlon will also feature a number of other IRONMAN and IRONMAN 70.3 champions, with Josh Amberger, Tim Van Berkel, Nicholas Free and Steve McKenna all racing.
