Gardner, Wasle Win Xterra Saipan

Press Release / 17.03.2016

­Australian Brodie Gardner and Austrian Carina Wasle captured the 15th annual XTERRA Saipan Championship titles on a picture-perfect day in the Northern Marianas on Saturday.

For Gardner, picking up his first-ever XTERRA World Tour win was all about timing … as in, just in time. “I had troubles with my visa on Thursday so couldn’t get out of Australia,” he explained.  “Worked on the problem all night and the next day and with the help of a lot people back home I was able to catch a flight out yesterday and I just here at about 2am this morning.”

Roughly seven hours later Gardner was the champ.

“I led out of the swim and went as hard as I could not to give it up,” said Gardner, 29, who works full-time as a strength and conditioning couch on the Sunshine Coast in Queensland. “I got lost in the caves, went right instead of left, bumped into the walls. It was pitch black in there.  Then I was trying to enjoy how pretty the beach run was except I was tired and I didn’t know how far I had left to go so just had to keep my focus and keep going through the finish line.”

His winning time of 2:52:46 was more than one-minute faster than runner-up Takahiro Ogasawara from Japan.  Joe Miller from the Philippines finished third.

In the women’s race Wasle came out of the water right behind Belinda Hadden and Renata Bucher, got in the lead early on the bike and never let go. “I felt very good,” said Wasle.  “I had a good training camp in South Africa at the beginning of the year and felt really strong today.”

It’s the 12th world tour win in the storied career of Carina Wasle, and her second in three years here in Saipan. “I love this place, and have friends here that I have to come see every year,” said Wasle.  “It’s a really beautiful course.  It tests you a lot.  The run is very technical.  It’s just a very special course with the jungle and the caves.  There is no race quite like this one.”

Wasle will now head back to Europe for the XTERRA European Tour season-opener in Malta, then go to XTERRA Reunion before continuing on the Asia-Pacific Tour in Australia and Malaysia.  She is one of the most adventurous, well-traveled XTERRA elites of all-time since her debut in 2005.

“It’s part of my life to travel and train and race.  I love to visit the countries and experience the culture. It’s a good life,” said Wasle.

Mieko Carey finished 2nd in the women's race, followed by 7-time Saipan Champ Renata Bucher in third.

Pos     Name, NAT     Time     S     B     R     Points
1     Brodie Gardner, AUS     2:52:46     15:21     1:33:40     1:03:45     100
2     Takahiro Ogasawara, JPN     2:54:14     17:10     1:33:27     1:03:37     90
3     Joe Miller, PHI     3:05:03     17:03     1:41:19     1:06:41     82
4     Kaon Cho, KOR     3:21:08     17:21     1:50:47     1:13:00     75
    
Pos     Name, NAT     Time     S     B     R     Points
1     Carina Wasle, AUT     3:05:40     17:16     1:43:06     1:05:18     100
2     Mieko Carey, JPN     3:12:40     17:20     1:44:31     1:10:49     90
3     Renata Bucher, SUI     3:22:38     17:02     1:52:16     1:13:20     82
4     Belinda Hadden, AUS     3:40:21     17:00     2:05:18     1:18:03     75