While Gaag, the 1999 titlist and currently No. 8 in the world, had to wait up to the second of the four-lap run before grabbing the lead for good en route to one hour 54 minutes and 49 seconds showing. Ashton successfully defended her crown in an awesome wire-to-wire fashion, clocking 2:08:10.
Gaag towed Daniil Sapunov, 2002 Asian Triathlon champion and world’s No. 108, to a 1-2 finish for the first timer Kazakhs in the 1.5-kilometer swim, 40-km bike and 10-km run blue-ribbon event sponsored by Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority, Philippine Sports Commission, Speedo, Enervon and John Hancock Insurance Co.
Sapunov crossed the tape 14 seconds adrift of Gaag.
Ashton, who had barely four hours of sleep after arriving here from Sydney on the eve of the race, checked in a hefty four minutes and 17 seconds ahead of Japanese Yokako Inoue, 2001 SUBIT runner-up and ranked No. 121 in the world.
Rounding out the winners’ circle in the race supported by Reliv, Powerbar, Monoc Bike Frames, David’s Day Spa, New Balance and POC Sport for All Commission were Portuguese Bruno Pais (1:55:36), the frontrunner most of the way, and Kazakh Ekaterina Shatnaya (2:12:24), ninth placer in last year’s Asian championship.
Ashton’s compatriot Malcolm Lyons (1:59:10), 2002 SUBIT winner and world’s No. 115, could only land in sixth position even as lone SUBIT back-to-back (2001 and ’02) champion Hong Kong’s Daniel Lee Chi Wo (1:56:14), world’s No. 68, settled for fourth place.
Japanese Junichi Yamamoto, frustrated twice at SUBIT with runner-up showing in 1997 and ’99, came in 5th at 1:56:47.
Aussie Conrick Boyd (1:59:10), HK’s Andrew Wright (2:00:10) and Samuel Leung (2:00:11) and Singapore’s Marco Grillo (2:05:43) completed the top 10 finishers.
In the accompanying Enervon National Triathlon Championship, George Vilog and Ani Karina de Leon retained their respective titles with times of 2:09:17 and 2:27:30, respectively.