Fourth for GB on penultimate day of World Champs
26th August 2013
The British team finished just outside the medals for the second time in as many days at the Modern Pentathlon World Championships in Chinese Taipei today (Monday).
The team of Kate French, Freyja Prentice and Mhairi Spence came home in fourth place in the women’s relay competition at the championships in Kaohsiung.
The trio went into the final event, the run/shoot, in sixth place. They clawed their way up through the field to come home fourth but missed out on adding to the GB team’s current medal tally of one gold and one silver.
The three British women started their day with joint seventh in the fencing, followed by eighth in the swim and then joint fourth in the riding arena. That put them sixth going into the run/shoot, but 74 seconds behind leaders Ukraine.
Ukraine went on to comfortably take gold, from Hungary and Russia. Fourteen teams contested the women's relay.
Jan Bartu, Pentathlon GB Performance Director, said: “They were a little bit flat in the fencing today and they didn’t have a particularly good ride. They managed to claw back a few places in the combined event, but unfortunately they weren’t in a position to fight for the medals.”
Kate French, Samantha Murray and Mhairi Spence won team gold for Britain on Saturday, the same day that Nick Woodbridge won an individual silver medal – the first individual World Championships medal won by a British man for 20 years.
Britain’s Joe Evans and Samantha Murray just missed out on a medal in the mixed relay yesterday (Sunday), finishing fourth.
Tomorrow (Tuesday) sees the final day of competition of the World Championships, with Jamie Cooke, Joe Evans and Nick Woodbridge contesting the men’s relay.
“It will be interesting to see how this line-up can do against the best in the world,” said Bartu. “There will be a lot of intense competition.”
Women’s relay results
Gold: Ukraine (Victoria Tereshuk, Iryna Khokhlova & Ganna Buriak) – 5532 points
Silver: Hungary Zsofia Foldhazi, Leila Gyenesei & Sarolta Kovacs) – 5384 points
Bronze: Russia (Donata Rimsaite, Liudmila Kukushkina & Alise Fakhrutdinova) – 5368 points
4th: Great Britain (Kate French, Freyja Prentice & Mhairi Spence) – 5208 points
GB team medals
Gold: women’s team - Samantha Murray, Mhairi Spence & Kate French
Silver: men’s individual – Nick Woodbridge