Kent triathlete Dean Ratcliffe prepared for the World Championships in style by winning his age group in London at the weekend.

The Walderslade based athlete competed on the second day of the competition over the Olympic distance, winning his age group and finishing 4th place overall from a field of more than 4,000 competitors including all age groups.

The London Triathlon is one of the largest triathlons in the world, with more competitors than any other and Ratcliffe explained how he used the event to gear up for the World Olympic distance triathon championships being held in Auckland New Zealand next month:

“After the two weeks of training in Portugal I was feeling really strong, my fitness is definitely coming close to its peak. I felt at the time that I was having a good race the transitions from swim to bike and there from bike to run went badly loosing me time, but getting the second fastest swim and the the fastest bike had me crossing the line 1st in my start wave.”

Ratcliffe will leave for NZ with the GB team including three other Age Group athletes from the Medway Towns.

They are Chris Butler from Rainham and Paul Sparks from Chatham (both 45 to 49yr AG) and also Deborah Hope from Rochester (35 to 39yr AG).

At the European Triathlon Championships in April this year, Ratcliffe won a Bronze Medal in his 45 to 49 year age group for the GB team competing at olympic distance (1500m swim, 40km bike and 10km run).

In June he picked up the British national title in the same category and in August became English national Champion. He spent two weeks at the beginning of this month preparing for the world championships in Portugal at the tri training harder training facility in Vilamoura, returning to the UK on the 20th September in order that he could compete in the London Triathlon on Sunday 23rd.

Ratcliffe went on to explain how he plans to use the next few weeks preparing for the World Championships in New Zealand:

“The next three weeks in the UK will be the time to sharpen up and increase my speed, before flying out to New Zealand on the 13th October. I will be spending a week in Auckland acclimatising and tapering for the race which will take place on 22nd of October. I’m feeling very confident and excited about the race, but know it will be no easy task to pick up another medal, as well as the competitors that beat me in the Europeans, the southern hemisphere and the USA have some fantastic triathletes, so I know I have to have a great race in order to get anywhere near the medals.”

“However I have set myself some aims for this race and they are to win a medal for GB, come in as the first place Brit and to deliver a personal best time, that would be the perfect race scenario for me, but to be honest I would be happy to deliver just one of those goals!”