Great Britain’s pentathlon performance director Jan Bartu has hailed Kate French after her fourth-place finish on debut in the World Cup final in Florida.
French’s sixth place at the World Cup in Chengdu, China, in April had been the best individual performance of her career and helped earn a place at the World Cup final in Sarasota for the first time.
And, despite focussing training on next month’s European Championships and the World Championships at the start of September, the world number 14 shone again and produced a strong all-round performance in Florida.
Gold went to Poland’s world number four Oktawia Nowacka, who has medalled at all three World Cup series events this year.
She held off Lithuania’s London 2012 Olympic gold medallist Laura Asadauskaite to take the title, with world number two Qian Chen from China taking bronze.
And although French missed out on the medals by just ten seconds after a day of fencing, swimming, riding and a run/shoot, Bartu was delighted by her efforts.
“Fourth was a fantastic result, especially as Kate is in full training at this point and there was no special preparation for this competition,” he said.
“It was another very promising performance by Kate. She was competing against some really fierce athletes in Sarasota and was very close to breaking into the medals."
© Sportsbeat 2014