Spence wins second World Cup medal of year

07 May 2011

University of Bath-based Mhairi Spence won her second Modern Pentathlon World Cup medal of the season when she took bronze in Hungary today (Saturday).

The 25-year-old Coach Education and Sports Development graduate produced a strong all round performance in World Cup 3 in Százhalombatta to win the third World Cup medal of her career.

It means British women have won medals at all three World Cups this year following Spence’s silver in the USA in February and Freyja Prentice’s bronze in Sardinia three weeks ago.

Spence, who was never outside the top three all day today, went into the run/shoot at the head of the leaderboard following the withdrawal through injury of France’s three-times world champion Amelie Caze. But despite shooting well, she was overtaken by Egypt’s Aya Medany, who went on to take gold, and later by Germany’s Olympic champion, Lena Schoneborn, who took silver.

Fellow Brit Freyja Prentice produced the fastest run/shoot of the day at Százhalombatta to climb from 31st to finish 10th overall, while Heather Fell came up with the third fastest run/shoot to climb from 30th to 14th. Katy Burke ended the day in 17th after having problems with her laser pistol in the warm-up ahead of the run/shoot.

Spence, who rounded off her day by hitting all five targets in just 16 seconds on her last visit to the shooting range, said: “I’m really pleased with the result. My fencing was a lot better today and I performed quite solidly throughout the whole day.

“I’ve been working hard and I managed to hold my form and nail the things that really mattered today,” said Spence.

The British team trains at the Pentathlon GB High Performance Centre at the University of Bath.

World Cup 3 women’s final results
Gold: Aya Medany (EGY) – 5452 points
Silver: Lena Schoneborn (GER) – 5448 points
Bronze: Mhairi Spence (GBR) – 5404 points
10th: Freyja Prentice (GBR) – 5220 points
14th: Heather Fell (GBR) – 5192 points
17th: Katy Burke (GBR) – 5152 points

Sponsors
Partners and Suppliers