By Abbey Cannan
Dressed in a Superman shirt, Shane Kent finished the last leg of a 515km endurance race at Noosa Main Beach, earning his title as the Ultraman Australia champion for 2021.
Kate Bevilaqua was this year’s female champion of the unbelievable, three-day annual race that has been running in Noosa since 2015.
Shane finished the race in 22 hours and 32 minutes, while Kate completed the event in 23 hours and 17 minutes.
The competition attracts athletes who seek to explore the extreme in physical and mental abilities, on an invitation-only basis.
On May 8,9 and 10, 35 athletes from across Australia came together to participate in the event which was cancelled last year due to Covid-19.
Event Coordinator Mel Kemp said it was amazing to be back in Noosa.
“It was such a loss for everybody to not be able to have the race last year, and also for the teams who organise it all,“ she said.
“Covid has put such a dampener on many sports, especially something like Ultraman where they put so much training into it.
“Words can’t describe the amount of emotion that was shown at each finish line each day from those athletes being able to compete again.
“It was amazing to see Kate Bevilaqua who broke a couple of records in her race.“
Day one of the contest began with a 10km ocean swim, followed by a 140km bike ride through the spectacular Sunshine Coast Hinterland.Day two was a 280km bike ride, and day three saw the athletes up early for a double marathon – that’s an 84.3km run.
The 2021 field included a number of returning athletes, but most were new to the distance.
Nine females competed along with 26 males. The youngest athlete to take on the challenge was 27, along with seven incredible athletes in their 50s.
Just under half of the competitors were from Queensland, with athletes and their crews travelling from almost every state to race.
Mel said there were also some Noosa locals who took on the challenge.
“They did really well and it’s great to see that it’s not just athletes coming from far and wide, it’s also challenging some of the Noosa locals,“ she said.
“We also had a handful of volunteers from Noosa which was wonderful.“
