TOP COP ANGIE SPORT GAVE ME STRENGTH'

The police constable is also a World Triathlon Champion

- Sharon Stephenson

Angie Keen's triathlon career didn't begin well. When the now World Triathlon champion turned up to her first endurance multi-sport event, she was the only adult competitor! "It was just me and a sea of kids," laughs Angie about the 2012 triathlon in Wellington, where she was living at the time.

"It was a bit embarrassing, especially as some of the kids were quite fast! I kept thinking, 'This is awful.

Why am I doing this?' But I finished it and had such a great sense of achievement that I immediately signed up for another event."

Now based in Rotorua, where she works as a police constable, Angie, 35, became so obsessed with triathlons that she can't remember how many she's completed.

"It must have be hundreds over the years! It's the strangest thing with triathlons - you hate it while you're doing it, but once you cross the finish line, you forget all about the pain and wonder when the next one is!"

Last year, athletic Angie's determination paid off when she took home several of the top prizes at the World Triathlon Championships in Spain, coming first in two events in her age group - the Super Sprint (a 300m swim, 6.4km bike ride and 1.6km run), as well as the Aquabike, which involves a 1.5km swim and gruelling 40km bike ride.