Canterbury's Emily Trevail had a stunning run on the 33km alpine stage to take a 21min lead over training partner Courtney Hawke. Both women are coached by multisport legend Flavio Vianna.
"We have a pretty good coach in our corner," Trevail said.
Trevail and Hawke, along with Louise Darwin and Southland's Sophie Shallard, all came off the beach together through transition to the 55km bike to Aickens, with all four sharing the load in the peloton.
It was on the run up Deception Valley that Trevail made her move and left them in her wake.
But the 67km kayak stage is proving the great unknown and could see all four women come together again for the 70km bike to New Brighton.
"It was a good push. The girls were going for it," Trevail said of the bike to Aickens.
But with Trevail, Hawke and Darwin all in the open elite class, the story of the day is the race from Shallard, who came in fourth to lead the under-23 elite class.
Just last weekend Shallard (21), finished second in The Magnificent, a Southland expedition race over 460km, and could be forgiven for weary legs as the gruelling climb to Goat Pass kicked in.
"I felt good on the bike but when I hit the run my legs just turned to jelly," Shallard said.
"It was quite fun out there. Quite challenging and technical. I ended up on my arse a couple of times. I just couldn't find anywhere to put my feet. You know. It's all learning."
Shallard said she was still feeling it a little after last weekend's race in The Magnificent.
"I'm still feeling all right. We'll see how tomorrow goes [today's kayak and bike stages to the finish]."
"I'm a bit of a novice," she said of her kayaking ability.
She trains on the Mataura River but said she will be picking the "chicken lines and hoping for the best" today on the Waimakariri.
"I'm looking forward to it and getting off the legs for a while."
Sam King battled through the hot and muggy conditions to take a 3min lead into the second day of competition in the two day individual men's section.
King got involved early, mixing it up in the lead group of 13 cyclists on the road to Aickens.
"It was a nice ride with everyone pulling turns," he said of the rotation up front.
A smooth transition to the 67km alpine stage saw him quickly open up a sizable lead heading in to Deception Valley, and the early group began to spread behind him.
"I wanted to get out of sight, out of mind," he said of his tactic to lead the run.
King wanted to run his own race, he said.
He takes an early 3min advantage into the second day of competition today, which involves a 67km kayak on the Waimakariri, which is running at one of its lowest levels in years at just 32 cumecs.
"It's going to be a long day so it should suit me well," he said of the low flow suiting him.
Breaking the tape at New Brighton today would be sweet for King, who turns 24 today, after he finished runner-up in the 2-day individual last year.
Fellow Cantabrians Jordan Sutherland and Alexis Migounoff followed King in yesterday to take second and third places on the grid heading into the kayak stage this morning.
First in the individual mountain running event was David Haunschmidt, who smoked the 33km alpine course in 3hr 27min 2sec.
A 35-year-old emergency department doctor in Wellington, Haunschmidt led from the start, despite it being his first time on the gruelling course.
"Yeah. I was pretty nervous about that, because everyone told me that I needed to know the routes and lines," he said.
"So I definitely made a few mistakes at the river crossings. Fell a few times."
One mistake that could have spelt curtains for him was when he took a tumble going through the terrain at Big Boulders, where fell a metre and a half and jarred his hip.
"But I made it and was able to keep going," he said shaking it off and admitting afterwards that previous experience on the course would have been better advised.
Emigrating from the Orkney Islands in 2016, Haunschmidt had never competed in any sports, and it was only New Zealand's big backyard that inspired him to take to trail running, triathlon and iron man. Next weekend he will be contesting the Moonlight Marathon in Queenstown.
"So I have a couple of days to put my feet up," he said.
Mount Hutt College year 13 pupil Sarah Reeve dominated the open women's section of the mountain run, completing the 33km course in 4hr 39min.
"It was so good. So hard though, I definitely recommend," she said.
Reeve competed last year in the team section, in which she did the kayak stage. The team got second in the mixed open.
Yesterday was the first time she had taken on the alpine run stage and admitted that she thought that she went out a little too fast and struggled a bit going up over Goat Pass.
But everything clicked back in on the run down the riverbed to Klondyke.
‘‘I thought ‘when can this be over?’," she said of her run over Goat Pass.
