Fighting against 25 kilometre headwinds, flies and hot bitumen Townsville man Jye Spriggs has taken out the Julia Creek South32 senior triathlon.
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His first time competing at the Julia Creek Dirt n Dust Festival, Jye has been preparing for the last 12 months for what some competitors call, Australia's toughest sprint triathlon.
"That was easily the toughest sprint triathlon I have done. That's what people claim it to be but until you've done it you don't realise how tough it really is." Jye said.
"Everyone talks about the headwind on the bike and I thought yeah sure it is tough, but this was next level.
"There were a couple of times I got the wobbles on the bike and I thought I was going to come down but I just had to hold on tight and stay strong.
"It was over 25km/h winds, so I was struggling to sit over 30km/h and usually sitting on 45km/h so it was brutal and mentally was not having a good time."
Jye was happy with his results completing the course in 01:14:32, but said it wasn't without the support of the crowd.
"The crowd was amazing and really got me through the run, I was feeling it from the start and having people the whole way along was just really good atmosphere, I really enjoyed it.
"My race was pretty good, I was stoked to get the win after planning this race for about a year.
"Over the last few years I have been doing triathlons at uni in Brisbane and then I've done a few local races in Townsville to start getting ready for dirt n dust."
In second place was Mount Isa competitor Michael Adendorff with a time of 01:24:35 followed by a Mount Isa rival Justin Bindley in third with 01:24:56.
In fourth place, and the first female to cross the finish line was Kim Alcorn with a time of 01:25:42.
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