British short-course stars Alex Yee and Jonny Brownlee have both hailed compatriot Lucy Charles-Barclay‘s incredible performance to win the IRONMAN World Championship in Kona last weekend.
Charles-Barclay led from start to finish as she won the coveted title for the first time in Hawaii, following four successive second places.
And in so doing, she became the third British winner after Chrissie Wellington and Leanda Cave.
Alex Yee on LCB win
Yee and Brownlee have won individual silver medals at the Olympics and both were glued to their screens as they watched Lucy’s triumph, with her strength of character to turn second into first clearly resonating with them.
“Her race was extremely inspiring,” Yee told us.
“I think, particularly for me, her having come second so often and the determination to keep coming back and performing at the level she did.
She absolutely demolished the race. She was just perfect from start to finish.
Alex Yee on Lucy Charles-Barclay’s IMWC triumph
“I think those races don’t come about often, but they’re magical when they do. So, yeah, huge well done to her and it’s inspiring for us British short-course athletes to look at how it’s done and hopefully one day…”
We’ll have a more in-depth interview with Alex here in the coming weeks but safe to say his focus is very much still with short course, although he didn’t rule out a step up in distance in the future!
Brownlee heaps praise on Lucy
And Alex’s praise for LCB was echoed by Brownlee, who told TRI247: “Last weekend I had the rugby union World Cup on one TV, rugby league on the other and Ironman on the iPad!
“It was absolutely brilliant and amazing. I’m really pleased for her because as someone like myself, who’s had lots of second places, to finally win it is fantastic.
“And the way she did it was really brave, to go from the start and not look back – she deserved that.”
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