SPRINGFIELD, Mo. – The Denver Pioneers women's triathlon team heads to Missouri on Saturday for the Western Regional Championships at Fellows Lake.
There are two waves for athletes to quality for the National Championships, with the first heat at 9 a.m. MT while DU and other D-I schools will compete in the second heat at 11 a.m. MT. The races will be streamed for free at
Planet417.com.
Among the other Division-I squads that the Pioneers will be racing against in the Western Regional are Arizona, Arizona State, South Dakota and Northern Kentucky. TCU, San Francisco, Queens, East Tennessee, Duquesne, Navy, Delaware State, Wagner and Hampton are racing in the East Regional on the same day in Raleigh, North Carolina.
This will be the third-of-four races for Denver this season and final tune-up before the Nov. 9 Collegiate National Championships. DU began the campaign one point off the top step of the podium in second place at the Southern Hills Triathlon Super Sprint on Aug. 31. The Pios' last race was two weekends ago where they placed fifth on a tricky bike course at the Battle in the Fort Collegiate Cup on Sept. 29.
Freshman
Ava Pfaff and senior
Olivia Ebenstein led Denver at Southern Hills by placing second and third, respectively, while freshman
Beatrice Normand was the top-placed finisher in Fort Worth in 17th.
The Pioneers placed second at Eastern Regionals last year and have finished on the podium in each of their last four regional races dating back to its 2021 win out east. The top three teams at regionals earn an automatic bid to the national championship, while the rest of the field is decided by individual rankings throughout the season.
Denver enters this week's regional championships as the fourth-ranked team in the nation.
The course at Fellows Lake begins with a 750-meter, triangular-shaped swim off a beach on the northwest side of the reservoir. The athletes then transition to a four-lap bike course in the park and on the adjacent East Farm Road 66, featuring two long straightaways but also four L-shaped turns and two 180-degree turns. The run is a two-lap, out-and-back course inside the park that follows the same bike straightaway.
All nine DU triathletes are expected to race this weekend at Regionals.
