KEY POINTS:
Samantha Warriner discovered the form of her life to power to victory in the World Cup triathlon race in Canada today.
The Whangarei multisport athlete exhibited stunning speed on the 10km run to burn off her rivals in Vancouver as she chalked up the fourth World Cup series win of her career, all of them coming in the past two years.
Warriner, 35 and the world No 7, blitzed the field in miserably wet, cold conditions with a run of 33 minutes 16 seconds, easily a personal best and comfortably too hot for her opponents to handle.
Her winning time of two hours three minutes 25 seconds was 36sec clear of second-placed American Sarah Haskins.
"To run what I did just blew me away. I'd never gone under 34 before so I am absolutely stoked. To do it in a World Cup race coming off a hard bike is just brilliant," a jubilant Warriner said.
Warriner's work for the day did not end once she crossed the finish line.
Moments after savouring her success, Warriner was helping compatriot James Elvery set up her bike for him to use in the elite men's race.
Elvery had his bike stolen last week, and found Warriner's wheels to his liking, finishing as the leading New Zealand male in 25th place, six sports ahead of Terrenzo Bozzone.
Warriner's success today vindicated a major change in her scheduling and bodes well for next year's world championships, being contested on the same course, as well as the World Cup race in Beijing on September 16, which doubles as the 2008 Olympics qualifying event.
In recent years Warriner found herself burning out by August-September so she backed off racing too hard this year, until now.
She was making only her second World Cup appearance of the season in the sixth event on the circuit on the back of a month's solid training in Canada.
The early signs were not promising as she exited the water some distance back from the leaders in 22nd place in the 40-strong field.
Americans Sara McLarty and Sarah Haskins broke away on the bike leg, helped by the holding tactics of compatriots Jasmine Oeinck and Sarah Groff at the head of the chasing bunch.
Their lead at the end of the bike leg was 1min 30sec, helped by a torrential downpour which made cornering treacherous and led to a number of spills.
Warriners managed to avoid any major mishaps on the bike then set about running down her rivals.
'The bike and run went superbly to plan, despite getting off the bike a long way down I knew the girls in front had been working hard and I had it in me to reel them in," she said.
"To be honest I was more concerned about (Australian) Erin Densham as she had stayed close to me on the bike and has great leg speed.
"But once I got into rhythm and focused on running down the leaders even Erin couldn't stay with me."
"Once I knew I had a sniff at a win I wasn't about to let it go.
"World Cup victories are so difficult to get and the competition is so tough at every race that it just drives you on the moment you are in contention."
Leading women's results:
1. Samantha Warriner (NZ) 2hr 03min 25sec
2. Sarah Haskins (USA) 2:04.01
3. Erin Densham (Australia) 2:04.11
4. Joelle Franzmann (Germany) 2:04.36
5. Elizabeth May (Luxembourg) 2:04.52
- NZPA
