Go Flora Go!

As you are likely aware, Jenn likes to do triathlons. She is also a fan of watching triathlons on TV, something we are fortunate to be able to do thanks to having a half-decent internet connection and a subscription to triathlonlive.tv. At first Jenn would watch them on her own, either on her iPad or on the TV if it was on early, and eventually I started watching with her as I saw the racing was actually pretty exciting!

What makes it all the more exciting is that Bermuda’s own Flora Duffy competes in these events. Living in any country it’s fairly easy to get swept up when one of your athletes is very competitive on a world stage, and even more so when it’s a small country like Bermuda. Jenn and her friends regularly have group bike rides with Flora’s mom & dad, have also done a few with Flora, the kids have met her, etc. so in that way there is more of a personal connection.

These last few years has been getting some great results on the ITU circuit (the was 7th overall last year), plus she is the reigning champ of the ITU Cross Triathlon World Championships as well as the Xterra (off-road triathlon) World Championships (since 2014!).

So with her recent success and this also being an Olympic year, we’ve been watching her this year perhaps more closely than usual. Her season in the main triathlon series (ITU) started on a high note with a 4th in the first race of the year in March, then got 4th in her next race, then 3rd, then 2nd, then a win (her first!) in Stockholm at the beginning of July, about a month and a half before the Olympic race. Flora Fever was at an all-time high and come August there was a pretty large crowd of supporters who came out to the local pub Docksiders for a big-screen viewing of the Olympic race! We donned our ‘Go Flora Go’ shirts and cheered her to an 8th place finish. It was disappointing (Flora said the same of herself) but we remained proud of her and looked ahead to the rest of the triathlon season!

After the Olympics there were a few more races left in the ITU series – she came away with a 4th in Edmonton and set her up for a possible win of the whole championship in the final race in Cozumel. She did not disappoint and killed it with another win, which secured her the 2016 championship! We were so excited we jumped in the car right after the win (this was at about 9pm) and drove over to Flora’s parents house to celebrate with Flora’s dad (he was there alone as his wife was in Cozumel cheering on Flora)! Good times!

Flora went on to also win this year’s titles in the ITU Cross Triathlon World Championships (2nd year in a row) and the the Xterra World Championships (third in a row)! What a year for her.

Given that Flora had such a great year the Bermuda Triathlon Association had a ‘meet and greet’ fundraiser with her.

The premier of Bermuda was there, her dad Charlie gave a nice speech… and of course the woman herself recapped her fantastic year for us. I didn’t take too many photos as I was near the front and didn’t want to be ‘that guy’…!