Rising star Emma Jackson will pursue her Olympic dream with renewed vigour after finishing fourth in the overall pointscore for the Triathlon World Championship Series.
Rising star Emma Jackson will pursue her Olympic dream with renewed vigour after finishing fourth in the overall pointscore for the Triathlon World Championship Series.
Jackson finished 12th in Sunday's last race in Beijing behind defending world champion and fellow Australian Emma Moffatt (11th), with Felicity Abram 13th and Olympic champion Emma Snowsill, who has battled the effects of a viral infection, 17th.
New Zealander Andrea Hewitt won the race to finish second in the series behind Britain's Helen Jenkins.
After the race, Jackson, the former schoolgirl Cross Country champion, revealed the battle scars of a long season, with bleeding feet and a lost toe nail on her left foot.
The 20-year-old Queenslander was one of a group of 30 athletes, including her three teammates, who were trapped in a chase pack on the bike, giving away two minutes to the lead group going into the final 10km run.
"If you told me at the start of season I would finish in fourth place on the World Championship Series pointscore I would have said you're mad," said a smiling Jackson after the race.
"This result sets me up nicely for the next 12 months and I'm excited and looking forward to what is going to be busy year with Olympic selection and hopefully I'll grab that place on the World Championship podium in 2012.
"But one thing is for sure, I will be trying to get a a better start to the season than I did in Sydney this year."
Emma Moffatt finished on strongly and revealed after the race that she "took in a heap of water" on the swim and it created havoc in the early stages of the bike, slowing her in transition.
"It cost me time and the chance to get on to that lead pack and it could have made a lot of difference," said Moffatt.
Snowsill, who was far from 100 per cent going in to the race, had salt rubbed into her wounds after suffering a time penalty, served on the final run leg.
It certainly wasn't the kind of "home-coming" Snowsill had hoped for after she was crowned Olympic champion on the Beijing course in 2008.
Her immediate focus now is on regaining full health and securing selection onto the 2012 Olympic team.
AAP