Multisport: Home success best for NZ's multisport queen

Elina Ussher is fired up for the Hutt City Crazyman event. Photo / APN

Elina Ussher has enjoyed a glittering international career of multisport success, but she still loves to compete at home and win local titles.

The 38-year-old professional athlete, wife of five-time Coast to Coast champion Richard Ussher, is one of the headline competitors in tomorrow's Hutt City Crazyman multisport race.

Ussher, a two-time winner of the Coast to Coast herself, said her best career result came when she won the Adventure Racing World Championship in 2001 in Switzerland with the Finnish team Nokia Adventure.

She says the Crazyman is a fun event to be part of, and cannot wait to race tomorrow.

"It's pretty special to race in Wellington," said the Finnish-born Kiwi. "It's New Zealand capital and a big city and so it's amazing how close to the city all the beautiful hills and trails are."

The Hutt City Crazyman has been central New Zealand's premier multisport event for almost a quarter of a century.

Established in 1991 the annual kayaking, mountain biking and trail running epic is one of New Zealand's longest running multisport events.

Past winners read like a who's who of multisport history and include world champions such as Richard Ussher, Jill Westenra, Gordon Walker, Emily Miazga, Elina Ussher, Kristina Anglem, Alex Stewart, Steve Gurney and Jess Simson.

On a course as spectacular as it is challenging, competitors will start with a 13km kayak leg from Days Bay, along Wellington Harbour's eastern coast to Petone Wharf and up the Hutt River.

Kayaks are swapped for mountain bikes for a 30km ride up the Hutt River Trail to Dry Creek where they go into Belmont Regional Park, riding over Boulder Hill to the base of Belmont Trig.

Then it's into running shoes for the 13km trail run around Belmont Trig and down Korokoro Stream to Petone foreshore and the finish back in Lower Hutt.

"The whole course will be pretty tough," said Ussher. "Also the weather in Wellington can be challenging, especially this time of year."

Making the challenge easier will be her husband Richard who has opted out of competing this year to support Elina in her title bid.

"We know each other well enough, so it's pretty easy to work as a team," she said.

The Usshers have a good record in the event. Richard has won it five times, Elina has won twice and is a course record holder in Wellington.

"I set a race record a long time ago [in 2011]. Now we are racing on a new course so times will be very different. The Crazyman is the second last race for me of this season before the winter so I have lots of training and racing in my legs by now."

Close to 400 competitors are expected to take part in the 56km event, which starts tomorrow at 8am at Days Bay beachfront in Eastbourne.