Dame Flora Duffy was crowned the Female Triathlete of the Year at the inaugural Global Triathlon Awards in Nice, France.
Dame Duffy couldn’t buy a break for much of the year. Seemingly determined to test the long-distance waters herself, she set out to qualify for the Ironman 70.3 World Championship at 70.3 Chattanooga, only to have to pull out of the race when she contracted COVID-19. She regrouped and set her sights on nailing the qualification at Ironman 70.3 Mont-Tremblant, only to have Air Canada leave her bike at the Denver airport.
She managed to regroup on the draft-legal front, backing up a third from the World Triathlon Championship Series (WTCS) Yokohama and a seventh at WTCS Leeds with a win at WTCS Hamburg. She defended her Commonwealth Games title in dominating style, beating her closest rival on the draft-legal scene, Georgia Taylor-Brown.
Her long-distance woes continued, though, with tough days at the Collins Cup and the PTO US Open, before she bounced back to her winning ways on the draft-legal front, thrilling her home country with a huge win at WTCS Bermuda.
All of which set up a final showdown for the world championship. To claim her fourth world title, Duffy had to win the Grand Final in Abu Dhabi. She did that in dramatic style, once again running away from Taylor-Brown to win the day and the world title.
It was that ability to seize the big days that tipped the scales in Duffy’s favour. In 2021, after taking the Olympic and world titles along with numerous WTCS titles, Duffy was even named Dame of the Order of the British Empire. While 2022 provided its challenges, in the end Dame Flora Duffy proved once again she’s at the top of the triathlon world.
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