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2023 Women's Team Minnesota...

Thursday, 18 January 2024 00:10

By Mav

Team Minnesota is the MMH committee’s attempt to provide a season-long “power ranking” of Minnesota’s most prolific and successful triathletes. It’s a similar concept as the PTO’s result-based ranking system. Goose and I come up with this list to motivate and reward our state’s multisport athlete’s. Last week, we revealed the men’s 2023 Team Minnesota. Below, in buckets of 3 after naming the top athlete, is the 2023 Women’s Team Minnesota:

Icon (#1): Heather Lendway

The cream of the crop (#2-4): Elena Hengel, Caryn Herrick, Vanessa Nagel

The all-stars (#5-7): Cami Eckhoff, Bettina Keppers, Cheryl Zitur

The Finalists (#8-10): Jan Guenther, Diane Hankee, Katie Kadera

(Revised Finalists: Diane Hankee, Katie Kadera, Bette Rowley)

Goose's Comments: I appreciate and respect Mav's choices, andI agree with ALMOST of them. I like his Top 7. It needs to be said that this year's Team was painfully difficult to determine. The ineligibility of true stars like SHYANNE MCGREGOR, CHISTINA ROBERTS, ELAINE NELSON and TIFFANY KARI-CIZMAS due to...

insufficient racing volume,opened the door for others to step through, and those that did were evenly matched from the standpoints of talent and performance. Where to position masters DIANE HANKEE and BETTINA KEPPERS, for example, was problematic, though I favor Mav's placement of Bettina ahead of Diane due largely to speed compared to race history, but it's possible that we have overlooked ANDREA MYERS. I like her racing volume and the quality of the fields she faced, but I would like to have seen a few minutes shaved off her Olympic times at Clearwater and Big Lake. 

Though JAN GUENTHER won the GMOY ahead of CHERYL ZITUR, that honor was based on performances against GM age groups, whereas Team MInnesota is not age-graded. For me, this carves out a spot for someone, so the next question is who grabs Jan's spot. KATIE KADERA is a good choice, but is she the best one? Here I look at head-to-head confrontations. Though she was beaten twice by EMILY GAGE, I am leaning toward BETTE ROWLEY. (Had Gage, who excels in sprints, been more competitive in her long-course performances, she would have grapped a spot. Rowley, though, beat Nagel, Myers and CHANTAL NACK at Hopkins and finished in a tighly contested Top 3 at Clearwater Sprint, where she also outraced Junior of the Year MACY IYER. Also, her 2nd at Pigman Sprint should not be overlooked.

So, is Rowley's resume strong enough to bump Myers or Most Improved honoree KATIE KADERA? Katie placed 3rd behind Zitur and Hankee at Chisago Sprint, and her 3rd at Maple Grove Sprint was solid. Finally, her winning time at Square Lake Sprint compard well with past women's champions there. And sise-by-side performance comparisons with Myers has me favoring Rowley.

So, for me is it Rowley and Kadera.