Spiteri leaves her mark in women's triathlon

Danica Spiteri stole the headlines yesterday when she handed Malta triathlon victory in the 2009 Mediterranean Friendship Games which came to a close last night in Sicily.

There was a record entry of 70 triathletes for the race which consisted of a 750m swim, a 20km cycle and a five-kilometre run.

Maria Grazia Prestigiacomo finished first in one hour 15 minutes and 15 seconds. However, the Italian was not eligible for the Friendship Games and victory was handed to Spiteri whose accumulated time was 1:17.40.

Spiteri's compatriot, Michelle Wood, was second in 1:18.02.

Sicily hit back in the men's triathlon. This race was dominated by Salvatore Campagna. He raced home first in one hour four minutes and 10 seconds followed by team-mates Giovanni Manzella and Vincenzo Dolce.

Malta's Dermot Galea was fourth in one hour eight minutes and five seconds while Mark Zammit was classified 13th overall.

Yesterday, Malta's ten-pin bowlers fought back from Friday's upset in singles and won the team competition at the Marsala Liquid club.

Mark Spiteri, Justin Caruana Scicluna and Kenneth Arpa went on to establish a new national record in a six-game match when compiling 4,098 points to beat the Sicilian selection whose total was 3,928.

Arpa also set a new national best with his individual score of 1,519 while Spiteri will return home with a personal best after hitting 1,380 pins.

In pool, Jesmond Schembri, Miguel Falzon and Kevin Mercieca came from behind to beat Sicily 5-4.

The Maltese trio were trailing 4-2 at the end of the third session but won the final three singles matches with Schembri clinching the all-important point in a decisive ninth game.

At the shooting range, William Vella hit an ISSF MQS of 571 but his effort was still was not enough for Team Malta to hold the upperhand over their Sicil-ian opponents in the 10m air rifle event for teams held at Erice.

Giovanni Matraxia, a silver medallist in the 2009 Italian Junior Championships, top scored with an impressive 585 ahead of team-mate Salvatore Catalano, 573, just two points ahead of Vella.

Charlo Chircop hit 547 to finish sixth with veteran Lawrence Darmanin compiling 538 points.

Sicily won the event with an overall score of 1,723 as opposed to Malta's 1,656.

The Sicilians also proved superior to the Maltese in weightlifting competitions as they won the Snatch and Clean and Jerk events.

A positive note for the Maltese were the results obtained by Clint Grech and Stephen Borg who set a new personal best in Clean and Jerk when lifting 115kg and 113kg respectively.

Sicily also had an edge in fencing yesterday.

In foil event for teams, Pierre Bianchi, Andre Zahra, Danika Formosa and Jessica Vella went down 45-20 but then produced a much stronger effort in epee and were only edged 43-41 by the hosts.

Kimberly Meli left a good impression in taekwondo after winning both her bouts yesterday.

Meli beat Alessandra Prestigiacomo 14-8 and then had the better of Gabriella Ferrara 17-8.

In the men's event, Josef Spiteri lost to Francesco Cappellano 15-5. The Maltese martial artist was also beaten by Davide Avena 15-8.

In equestrian, Team Malta was handicapped as they did not have enough time to get acquainted with the horses provided by the Sicilians.

Neil Psaila, mounting Fartosu, totalled eight points in the first round and 16 in the second.

Daniel Micallef achieved the best result for Malta when he finished with four penalty points but Thomas Xuereb could only complete one round as his mount, Pacos, was not in a good shape to finish the competition.