Former winner for Bonaqua Africa Triathlon Cup Troutbeck

Ricky Zililo, Senior Sports Reporter
INTERNATIONAL athletes are expected to arrive in Harare for the 15th edition of the Bonaqua Africa Triathlon Cup Troutbeck tomorrow, before being whisked away to Nyanga for the meet set for Saturday, April 1.

Coca-Cola and Schweppes, through the Bonaqua water brand are the title sponsors of the event that draws participants from across the globe.

Two-time Troutbeck elite men’s winner Ayan Beisenbayev from Kazakhstan, South Africa’s pair of Dylan Nortje and Shaun Wolfaardt, Badr Siwane from Morocco, Martin Demuth of Austria and Michal

Oliwa from Poland are some of the top athletes heading to Zimbabwe for the prestigious competition.
As of Monday, 32 elite athletes, both men and women from across the world had registered for the continental showpiece that will run concurrently with the Junior Africa Cup.

According to the pre-event schedule, visiting international athletes will arrive at the Robert Mugabe International Airport on Thursday, before embarking on the 270km road trip to Nyanga.
Course familiarisation will be done on Friday, starting with the cycle course at 9am, then swim at 10am with the second swim acclimatisation at 2pm.

Participants at the event that is being co-sponsored by Simbisa Brand, Cimas i-Go, CFAO Motor Group, EcoCash and Rooneys, will compete in standard and sprint age groups National Championships, super sprint (non-championships). In the non-championships, teams can enter any distance and this is the category where there shall be the Corporate Triathlon Challenge.

There is also the youth super sprint (U13-U15 National Championships).

There will also be duathlon age groups sprint and the Corporate Challenge Duathlon.

Mountain biking will be competed over 14km, 28km and 40km courses.

For aquathlon super sprint distance, individuals and teams can register to compete in open water swim of 5000m, 3000m, 1500m, 750m and a 4x500m relay.

Meanwhile, the team “building the venue” at Troutbeck Resort left Harare on Sunday to start setting up the stage for the world class event. – @ZililoR