Marceau returns for XTERRA Saipan

Two-time Olympian Olivier Marceau of Switzerland will be back for the 2012 XTERRA Saipan Championship after missing the Crown Jewel in the last four years.

Wolf Mojica, president of Taga, Inc., which organizes XTERRA Saipan and Tagaman, said Marceau is one of the many pros competing in this year’s XTERRA Saipan, which will be held on March 24.

“We also expect defending champion Shonny Vanlandingham, former champion Renata Boucher, PIC Double winner Carina Wasle of Austria, and Denison Freitas from Brazil. There are four other pros, friends of Sam Gardner, namely Cedric Lassonde, Ben Allen, Jacqui Slack, and Graham Wadsworth. Many of these athletes will be doing XTERRA Philippines before they come to Saipan,” Mojica said in an email to Saipan Tribune.

Mojica managed to invite these pros to join XTERRA Saipan after making a trip to the 2011 XTERRA World Championship in Maui, Hawaii last October.

Marceau had his XTERRA Saipan debut in 2004 and won the off-road race right away with a time of 2:33:20. He also topped Tagaman en route to claiming the PIC Double crown. Then in the next three years, the “Swiss Machine” went on to defend the men’s title. The 2000 Sydney and 2004 Athens Olympics participant timed in at 2:33:47 in the 2005 XTERRA Saipan to beat Japan’s Hideo Fukui (2:34.48) and 2:35:06 in 2006 to edge another Japanese triathlete, Yu Yumoto (2:55:28). In his last year in the grueling off-road race before missing the event for four years, Marceau submitted his best time in XTERA Saipan at 2:27:16 to foil the upset bid of United Kingdom’s Sam Gardner (2:36:58) and Australia’s Andrew Noble (2:39:56).

Noble went on to win XTERA Saipan in 2008 with Marceau starting his four-year absence, while Gardner reigned supreme in the annual event from 2009 to 2011. He will not be able to defend his title this year, as he has to attend to his wife, who will be giving birth to their first born in March.

In the four years he missed XTERRA Saipan, Marceau opted to join a few races around the world. Last year, his most notable event and win came from the lung-busting Extreme-Man 226 event in Salou, Spain in June. The Swiss completed the 3.8-kilometer swim, 180-km bike ride, and 42.2-km run on the hot and hilly course on the Mediterranean coast of Spain in 9:29:04.

Then four months later, he also returned to the XTERRA World Championship in Maui and finished sixth overall with a time of 2:29:40.

Meanwhile, with pros joining XTERRA Saipan and possibly Tagaman, Mojica is asking the help of the members of the sports community for a home stay arrangement for the visiting athletes.