Sunday, October 11, 2009
Lea Langit

TRIATHLETE Lea Coline Langit reaped the fruit of her hard work as she won a gold and a
bronze medal in the 2009 Asian Aquathlon Championship-Invitational Triathlon held in
Palenbang, Indonesia the past weekend.

Langit who was sent by the Triathlon Association of the Phliippines (TRAP) for training in
Australia and Korea the past months, won her first international tournament this year as
she emerged champion in the Asian Aquathlon disputed Saturday.

Langit negotiated the 1-kilometer swim and 2.5-k run in 25 minutes and 31 seconds on
splits of 15:16 in the swim and 10:07 in the run leg.

She defeated Australia's Regina Wright with 26:22 and Singapore's Li Ying with 26:31 for
the Asian title.

Two aquathletes from Russia namely Anastacsia Polyanskaya and Lubou Ivanovskaya
submitted the two best time in the race at 25:17 and 25:20 but their efforts were not counted
since Russia is not part of the Asian continent.

The 22-year old sports management graduate from La Salle who has decided to go full-time
in the endurance sport this year, gave a good account of herself against the two Russian as
she led the first two loops in the swim leg.

She came out of the swim along with Ivanovskaya and trailed Polyanskaya by just two
seconds heading into the run. But the Russians made use of their long limbs to spoil the
challenge of Langit.

Langit, who was supported by Philippine Sports Commission and Subic Bay Metropolitan
Authority (SBMA) completed a fruitful stint in the tournament organized by the Indonesia Triathlon Association as she bagged the bronze in the international triathlon event held Sunday.

A bronze medal winner in the 25th Dijon Triathlon held in France last July, Langit bucked
tiredness as she negotiated the 1.5-k swim, 40-k bike and 10-k run event in two hours,
16 minutes and 4 seconds which was two minutes behind the two Russian opponents for
the first and second placings.

Langit did most of the work in the bike leg and felt throwing up during the run leg due to the
fact that she had barely enough time to recover from the aquathlon event the day before. But she
managed to held her ground against the rest of the field to make it to another podium finish.

The strong performance by Langit came after she finished fourth in the 70.3 Putra Jaya,
Malaysia last October 4 with her time of 4 hours and 46 minutes. Next stop for Langit is the
Asian Duathlon Championship slated November 15 at Subic Bay. Langit along with Monica
Torres and Kim Mangrobang will banner the women's team campaign in the ADC against a
host of foreign particpants from at least 15 countries