Evans happy with Chengdu showing after earthquake
BySportsbeat
Updated 20/04/2013 at 11:50 GMT
Joe Evans was pleased with his performance in the third modern pentathlon World Cup event of the season in China, which went ahead despite an earthquake.
Rescue workers sit on the debris of destroyed houses after a strong 6.6 magnitude earthquake, at Longmen village, Lushan county, Ya'an, Sichuan province (Reuters)
Image credit: Eurosport
The 19-year-old, who claimed bronze at the World Cup opener in California in February, was Britain's sole qualifier for the men's final in Chengdu after placing sixth in qualification group B.
However as Evans was preparing to leave his hotel an earthquake struck China with its epicentre about 70 miles from Chengdu, although events still went ahead as planned.
Evans started the fencing element well, with 23 wins from his 35 bouts for second, but twisted his right ankle during and couldn't kick properly in the 200m freestyle swim.
He was still joint second overall afterwards but dropped out of the top 10 during the ride with his 920-point haul relegating him to 13th before hobbling in the run/shoot element to finish 20th.
Pavlo Tymoshchenko took victory and Evans, who has made the finals at all three of his World Cups to date, insists the challenges of competing in Chengdu will be beneficial in the long run.
"I had just got up when the building started shaking," said Evans. "I went over to the window and could see slates coming off the roof on the other side of the road.
"I didn't know what was going on and thought 'what on earth was that'. It probably went on for about ten or 20 seconds. Fortunately everyone here was fine.
"I had the best fence I've ever had, it was fantastic. But after rolling my foot I had to make the best of a bad job and I had to hobble round the run at the end.
"I'm pleased to have made the final and competing was a valuable experience for me."
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