Paris Olympics: Cassandre Beaugrand wins France's first triathlon gold
Visit our website:
http://www.france24.com
Like us on Facebook:
https://www.facebook.com/FRANCE24.English
Follow us on Twitter:
https://twitter.com/France24_en
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00That's right Jeannie and a historic gold for Cassandra Beaugrand, the first time ever that
00:05the French have won a gold medal in a triathlon and she did it in quite some style. She provided
00:13a stunning performance here in her home town reared on by lots of French fans here in the
00:20center of Paris. She powered into the lead in the final moments of this race on the running
00:27leg. She was a good six seconds ahead of her nearest competitor Julie Deron from Switzerland
00:33finishing in second with Beth Potter from Team GB finishing in third. Beaugrand who collapsed on
00:40the floor in complete disbelief when she finished that race. A stunning finish from the young
00:45French woman after a 1500 meter swimming leg followed by 40 kilometers of cycling and topped
00:51off with a 10k here in the center of Paris. A historic gold for the French now as you said
00:56a six gold medal for the French at this Olympics so far. Right and it was really incredible to
01:02finally see the athletes swimming in the Seine for the very first time. Even more incredible
01:06given all the heavy rain we had again here overnight in Paris.
01:12That's right Jeannie there's been obviously a lot of doubt surrounding the river Seine and
01:16these open water events. There was a lot of heavy rain on the day of the opening ceremony
01:20and on day one of events and then a big storm again last night because of the very hot weather
01:26here in France. But it's gone ahead World Triathlon saying that the tests were deemed
01:33good enough that the water quality was deemed good enough for athletes to take a dip. There's
01:37obviously a lot of questions surrounding just how good the water quality is and obviously a lot of
01:42people are you know divided really. Some people saying, some athletes saying that it's great
01:48that it's taking place in the city center. You've got lots of people watching here which isn't
01:53always the case when it's elsewhere. But other people will be worried obviously and concerned
01:58about athletes health for the men's race which is currently taking place right now. Well that
02:02had to be postponed. That was supposed to take place yesterday morning potentially affecting
02:08some of the athletes preparation. But that has gone on as planned as well. We'll have to see
02:14for the other open water swimming events that are set to take place whether the water quality
02:18will be deemed good enough as well. But obviously the big legacy of this Games is that Parisians
02:22themselves are supposed to be able to take a dip from 2025. The big legacy of this Games
02:27is that there should be free swimming points for Parisians from next year.