PONTEVEDRA, Spain – During the opening days of the 2026 World Triathlon Championship, the Sun Devil Triathlon program has seen success in both the Junior Championship and U-23 Championship races, the latter highlighted by a third-place finish from senior Sidney Clement and a fourth-place finish from Naomi Ruff.
Clement became just the sixth Canadian athlete to earn a podium finish at the World Triathlon Championship U23 race and the first since Ellen Pennock (silver) and Amélie Kretz (bronze) at the 2013 event. She joins Kretz, Joanna Brown (2012) and Paula Findlay (2009) as all-time Canadian bronze medalists at the event.
Clement, a Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada, native and representing her home country at the event, came out of the gate with a 10:22 opening swim lap – good enough for 18th place – before cutting her next lap down to a 9:53 for a posted 20:15 1.5km swim time.
Following a 1-minute, 13-second transition time into the bike, Clement made up time with the seventh-best 40km cycling time at 1:03:30, heading into the final portion of the race – a 10km run.
After a 25-second transition off the bike into the running phase, Clement finished each of the four laps in either third or fourth place with a 35:44 run time to edge out her former teammate Ruff by 17 seconds to each a spot on the podium.
Ruff, who entered the event wearing the No. 1 start number, had 20:39, 1:04:20, 34:46 swim-cycle-run splits to finish 3:12 back of France’s Ilona Hadhoum for the race win.
Alex Campbell posted the seventh-best swim time with a 20:08, before having the 10th-best cycling time at 1:03:35.
On Thursday, Brooke Rousselle, a freshman out of Calgary, Alberta, Canada, was the Sun Devils’ top performance in the Junior Championship event with a 1:02:34 time, which was just 3:13 back of Hungray’s Fanni Szalai for the race win.
During the event, Maja Brinkmann posted the 12th-best 750m swim time at 10:16, while Rousselle posted a 32:17 20km cycle time leading into the final portion of the event – a 5km run – which the Canadian had the top Sun Devil time at 17:49.
U-23 Championship Results:
3rd: Sidney Clement, 2:01:06
4th: Naomi Ruff, 2:01:23
19th: Alex Campbell, 2:03:15
29th: Zoe Mari Adam, 2:05:09
34th: Britney Brown, 2:06:30
Junior Championship Results:
17th: Brooke Rousselle, 1:02:34
43rd: Kathrin Ritter: 1:04:07
54th: Maja Brinkmann, 1:06:04
Up Next:
Alex Campbell and Sidney Clement will represent Canada, while Naomi Ruff will participate for the USA and Kathrin Ritter will wear Austria attire as the quartet will participant in the Mixed Relays portion of the 2026 World Triathlon Championships in Pontevedra, Span on Sunday, Sept. 27. The event will close out the five-day World Triathlon Championship event.
Meanwhile, six Sun Devils – Luna Sraka, Sonja De Koning, Alice Alessandria, Cara Macdonald, Emma Rysavkova and Tyler Kovak – will participant in the Desert’s Edge Collegiate Cup in Loma, Colorado on Sunday, Sept. 27.
Follow Us:
For the latest information on the team, follow @SunDevilTri on X, Facebook and Instagram. General athletic news can also be found at @TheSunDevils on X, Instagram and Facebook.