Triathlon: Gilfillan's taking up the Ironman challenge (From Bournemouth Echo)

Triathlon: Gilfillan's taking up the Ironman challenge

11:40pm Wednesday 28th July 2010 in

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BOURNEMOUTH'S British middle-distance triathlon champion James Gilfillan will be heading for Florida in November after qualifying at the weekend for the Half-Ironman World Championships in Clearwater.

Gilfillan, 31, came 13th overall out of 1,200 in the qualifying event in Belgium, known as the Antwerp 70.3 – a reference to the total swim-cycle-run distance of 70.3 miles.

Surprisingly, though, he was not the first British finisher – nor even the first Bournemouth finisher.

Those honours went to Lee Piercy, of Southbourne, who was eighth overall and both the first Briton and the first non-professional.

Piercy has opted not to compete in Florida but Gilfillan, 31, has already accepted the invitation that followed his Antwerp result.

“I’m going there hoping to be seriously competitive and to win a medal in my 30-34yrs age group,” said the Poole planning officer, who lives at Westbourne.

Gilfillan’s Antwerp success came just a few weeks after he won his first British title with a thoroughly convincing performance in the national event at Lake Bala in Wales.

He completed the 2km swim, 80km bike ride and 20km run in 3hr 47min 15sec, making him the first of only two competitors out of nearly 600 to complete the course in less than four hours.

“I won by 11 minutes, which was somewhat unexpected,” he said. “I was surprised and obviously very pleased.”

As a youngster, Gilfillan was a competitive swimmer with Stourbridge SC in Worcestershire.

He took up the triathlon in 1995, when the sport was in its infancy, and represented Great Britain as a junior in world and European championships in the late 1990s.

He does his swimming training with former Bournemouth Dolphins head coach Laurie Dormer’s Littledown Masters group and recorded a personal best time in the swim in Lake Bala.

“I’m probably swimming as well as I have ever done on the back of Laurie’s coaching,” said Gilfillan, who was also first home in last month’s British Heart Foundation Pier to Pier Swim.