Vegan Gawthorne takes world duathlon title
Vegan food entrepreneur Lisa Gawthorne is world Duathlon champion after a blistering race in Ibiza.
She came first in her age group just six weeks after winning the European championship. The duathlon consists of an 18.6 km bike race sandwiched between two runs of 4.8 km and 2.8 km respectively. Reflecting on the race, the Team GB athlete said:
“It was a tough race from start to finish as it was 22 degrees and muggy so everything felt tough.”
“Bike was very tough – I was on my own for 4.5 miles in the wind…53% of the ride was in my max heart rate zone. “
“Final run was just ok – 95% of this was in my max heart rate as the bike did its damage so just kept to a balanced pace without doing anything crazy.”
Lisa has been vegetarian since the age of six and vegan since she was 21. She now competes in the 40-44 age category. She has been competing at European level since 2017 and has represented Great Britain at Cross Country running too. She’s a member of Vegan Runners UK and wears the club vest in a lot of events.
“I am a huge animal lover and that was originally my reason for going veggie at the young age of six…I made the connection that meat was actually of animal origin and felt it was wrong to carry on eating any meat for that reason.”
Content sourced and adapted with permission from Great Vegan Athletes.
About the author
Nicholas Hallows
Nicholas has been vegan since the early 2000s and worked for Viva! between 2017 and 2020 as a Senior Administrator and Web Content Assistant. He is a qualified teacher, specialising in Language and Literacy, and an accredited Proofreader and Editor. He is now a freelance writer covering topics including veganism, mindfulness and minimalism.
