Jarrod Poort is gradually coming into his own among elite open water swimmers as he upset a world-class field at the 10 km Swim The Swan event at the BHP Aquatic Super Series in Perth’s Swan River yesterday. The results are as follows:

1. Jarrod Poort 1:54:16.00
2. Simon Huitenga 1:54:19.59
3. Rhys Mainstone 1:54:23.79
4. Kane Radford 1:54:25.02
5. Alex Meyer 1:54:35.67
6. Troyden Prinsloo 1:54:37.35
7. Sam Sheppard 1:54:40.25
8. Joshua Richardson 1:54:54.35
9. Phillip Leonard Ryan 1:55:24.91
10. Aimeson Sparks-King 1:56:23.37
11. Troy Balvert 1:57:06.14
12. Yoelvis Pedraza 1:57:06.89
13. Liam Albery 1:57:07.21
14. Ridge Grimsey 1:57:59.34
15. Michael Sheil 2:00:44.06
16. Marcus Hall 2:02:10.38

“I knew it was going to be difficult coming up against Rhys, Simon and all of the international boys so my goal was to stick with the pack and take it easy for the first 7.5 km and then just give it everything in that last lap and hope my speed work from the pool would pay off,” Poort told Swimming Australia.

The weekend saw an international flavor to the top of the awards podium with Heidi Gan of Malaysia and Yasunari Hirai of Japan taking the top honors in the 5 km and Ashley Twichell of the U.S.A. and Poort of Australia taking the 10 km.

Photo courtesy of Swimming Australia shows Jarrod Poort with 15-year-old Chelsea Gubecka who defended her 10 km Australian open water title after finishing only slightly behind the American duo of Ashley Twichell (2:03:51.27) and Haley Anderson (2:04.17.41) in a time of 2:04.18.94.

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