Radford and Webby finish on top in final of New Zealand Ocean Swim Series

Local swimmers Kane Radford and Charlotte Webby wrapped up the New Zealand open water swimming season with convincing wins in the final race of the New Zealand Ocean Swim Series, the King of the Bays swim, held on Auckland’s North Shore on 2 April. For Webby, the win also cemented her position at the top of the leader-board for the full series. And while Radford has now won three events in the series, so has Nathan Capp, leading to a tie-break situation for the overall prize. While it was initially thought that Radford had won the overall series, a second analysis of the results from all previous events in fact showed that Capp had the greater winning margin and so has been awarded the series title. 

The seven-series competition combines a popular mass participation swim with an elite championship over a range of distances and settings around the country. This season saw the addition of the first inland swim at Rotorua and a return to Corsair Bay in Christchurch following a three year break due to the earthquake.

Conditions were reported as ‘near-perfect’ for the 2.8km swim, which Radford finished in 29:24 while Webby took 31:02 to win the women’s event.

The two winners were followed home by 1550 swimmers of all ages and abilities, including Commonwealth Games silver medallist and three-time Olympian Dean Kent and former world champion triathlete Terenzo Bozzone.

This was the 13th running of the event founded by Scott Rice in 2004.

Find out more: www.oceanswim.co.nz

Image: 2015/2016 NZ Ocean Swim Series winners Kane Radford and Charlotte Webby, © Simon Watts

Note: this article was updated on 3 April 2016 to reflect additional information received from the event organiser.