Flora Duffy was unable to hold off Gwen Jorgensen on the final day of the Island House Triathlon in Bahamas yesterday.

Duffy was in third place going into yesterday’s deciding event — the sprint-distance race — and led after a strong 20 kilometres bike but was caught during the 5k run by Jorgensen, of the United States.

It was the second successive title for Jorgensen, the Olympic gold medal-winner in Rio, at the Island House Triathlon, finishing with an overall time of 3hr 55min 06sec.

Duffy’s overall time for the three events — individual time-trials, enduro and sprint non-drafting — was 03:55:18 to claim a portion of the prize pool of $500,000 — a record for any competition of its type in the world. Holly Lawrence, of England, came third overall in 03:56:17.

Jorgensen was favourite to defend her crown after a dominate performance on Saturday’s enduro — a serious test for the triathletes who were required to perform a 750 metres swim, run 5km, bike 40km, and then swim another 750 swim before running their second 5k. Duffy finished second in the enduro behind Jorgensen, with the Bermudian also finishing runner-up in the time-trial on the opening day.

Jorgensen produced an outstanding bike during Saturday’s enduro, finishing with an overall time of 01:59:11, with Duffy second in 2:00:20 and Ellie Salthouse, of Australia, third in 2:00:41.

The field was then cut to the top-ten triathletes for yesterday’s time-trial, with Jorgensen leading with a combined time of 02:56:53 with Lawrence in second in 02:57:38 and Duffy dropping to third in 02:57:48.

In the men’s race Richard Murray, of South Africa, won the event with an overall time of 03:35:34, with Cam Dye, of the US, second in 03:36:04 and Aaron Royle, of Australia, third in 03:38:12.

Duffy is one step away from completing a remarkable hat-trick of world titles this season.

The ITU WTS World Champion, Duffy added the Xterra World Championship title to her list of achievements this month with her most dominating performance so far.

Next up is the ITU Cross Triathlon World Championships next month in Snowy Mountains, Australia, where she is again the defending champion.