Multisport success

Sophie Thomas-Hurley has been making waves on the multi sport circuit.

Hi my name's Sophie and I've been privileged to be a part of a number of multi sport events across the West Coast for this year. 

My mum has always encouraged my family to get outdoors. After lockdown, she got a bit more serious and started looking at topo maps and figuring out where to drag the family to next. We have always loved the adventures mum would take us on and the climbs started to get bigger. 

My mum and dad had previously done the Buller Half the previous year and I had my sights set to be that fit and be able to compete in something like that. So we signed up for the half of 2024 and so instead of hiking up mountains we ran around mountains. I had followed the 3 month training plan with good base fitness behind me from the year 2023, I just had to commit. It was awesome to see my improvement on a little app called strava and compete with my mum to see who ran faster or more in the week. The Buller Half came around and all the training had paid off. The atmosphere was amazing and I ended up 3rd for under 18s.

Once I had recovered and trained a bit more the Kaniere triathlon came around and I entered my first senior length duathlon. I ended up coming second in that race. It was so great to see so many faces and have a duathlon in Hokitika.

In between I have been holding my fitness at Hokitika Cycling Club. Two weeks after Kaniere, it was time to do the Moonlight Mountain Race. I entered the Biathlon. I placed 4th in that section, this was a bit of a challenge with the mountain biking aspect as this is quite different to road racing.

Then onto the last duathlon of the circuit, the South Westland Triathlon. I’d won a free entry from the Kaniere event so my mum and I entered the duathlon and placed 2nd.

Over the past year I have ran a lot, biked a lot and learnt a lot. I have enjoyed every moment of these events, even the early 6am training.. What is next ? I have next got my sights set on Cape Fear, a team adventure race in Westport.