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KEY POINTS:
Auckland's Gordon Walker blitzed the field to win his second Speight's Coast to Coast title yesterday.
For so long the bridesmaid to Richard Ussher, Walker dominated from the start to win by over 30 minutes.
Coast to Coast legend Steve Gurney said it was a long time since
he had seen a more dominant performance.
"I am surprised that the other guys didn't give him more of a run because he just owned the race from the mountain run on," Gurney said. "I think Keith Murray won by over 20 minutes when he won in 1994 but I can't remember a bigger winning margin."
Walker coped easily with the lowest water level in the Waimakiriri River for many, many years, although he said the wind was more of a factor.
"There was a head wind all day so I tried to conserve my energy because it got really hard towards the end," he said.
Not as hard as it got for surprise third-placed finisher Luke Chapman, who took a wrong turn on Colombo Street, just a few minutes from the finish, which ruined his chances of catching his training partner from Nelson, Trevor Voyce.
Voyce, a 28-year-old personal trainer and 24-year-old Chapman came into the race hoping for a top-10 finish but exceeded their expectations by finishing second and third.
"I can't believe it." said Voyce. "We were both keen to give it a good nudge but this is crazy."
Voyce and Chapman beat more fancied and experienced competitors like Luke Vaughan, Marcel Haegener and Gordon Blythen and Walker admitted he hadn't a clue who his closest challengers were.
"I didn't know who those guys were but they were with me on the run and they were running really well. I don't know how they did on the paddle or on the bike but it is good to see some young guys coming through."
And what about Walker? Will he be back to defend his title against the young guns?
"You ask me that question at this time every year. I'd love some new challenges and that includes an ironman but I love this race. It is brutally hard at times but it is the best one-day race in the world. It is the perfect course and it is pretty special to go from one side of the country to the other."
Walker was never really in trouble at any stage in the race, although Olympic rower Carl Meyer put in an early burst on the first bike leg to establish a five-minute lead going into the mountain run.
However, Walker was well positioned in ninth and even at that early stage felt like the race was his to lose.
"At the start of the mountain run I was running at a pace that was good for me and faster than anyone else, so I just tried not to get ahead of myself and stay focussed," he said.
Walker finished the run just behind Carl Bevins and wasted no time in making the decisive move in the race, easing past him just a couple of kilometres into the 15km cycle from Klondyke Corner to the start of the kayak leg at Mt White bridge.
Walker is known as a strong paddler and an even stronger cyclist and it was game over with half of the race still ahead of him. So it proved.
Whakatane's Neil Jones, who won the Longest Day in 1996, teamed up with his 18-year-old son Daniel Jones to win the two-day teams event while Robert Loveridge and Chantal Knox won the two-day individual categories.