Hellenic Academy student Gabrielle Dumont de Chassart wowed the South African crowds as she raced into a strong bronze finish at the Discovery World Triathlon Cape Town Event on Saturday, 24 April 2016. Finishing in an overall time of 1:10.18, de Chassart was third in her 16-19 age group of a field of 16 competitors, fourth in the field of 84 women and 16th out of an overall field of 202 competitors.
After the half kilometer swim, de Chassart was in 7th place for her age group, but a strong showing in the 20km cycle portion of the race brought her up to second place, before her final 5km dropped her to third.
Fellow Hellenic classmate, Alex Colegrave, also had an impressive day in Cape Town, finishing the course in 1:07.38 which placed him tenth in his age group out of 32 contenders, tenth by gender out of 118 men and 11th overall out of the 202 participants in the sprint solo race.
Colegrave started in the middle of the pack, ranking only 18th after the swim section, but pulled up to ninth in the cycle before finishing 10th in his category after the run.
Colegrave and DeChassart were the U17 male and U19 female Zimbabwe National Triathlon Champions this year after the championships at Troutbeck in March. Both are bright lights for Zimbabwe’s future representation in triathlon on the international stage.