ROCKY GAP — Dr. Vinnie Monseau of Morgantown, W.Va., continued his dominance with his 10th championship in the 22nd annual Cumberland YMCA Rocky Gap sprint triathlon, while race newcomer Jason Goyanko of Vienna, Pa., pulled away from the field to win the first international distance competition on a perfect Saturday morning for the two races.

Frostburg’s Loren Winebrenner, a three-time winner in the sprint race, led the entire race in taking the women’s division in the first international distance race. Jen Sober of Deep Creek Lake was the first woman to cross the line in the sprint race.

The sprint race, which had a few course changes, consists of a one-quarter mile swim in Lake Habeeb, an eight-mile bicycle leg, and a 3.2-mile run. There were 245 finishers in one of the largest fields in the history of the event. The new international distant event had a 0.9-mile swim, a 22.5-mile bicycle race, and a 6.2-mile run. There were 98 finishers.

Monseau elected to run the shorter race as a training run for today’s Eagle Run Half Ironman Triathlon in Cambridge. The 40-year-old former emergency room doctor, who just opened the Health Matters Urgent Care facility at the Bel Air Plaza in Cresaptown, toured the course in a time of 45 minutes and 9 seconds.

Phillip Mazza of Westminster, Colo., was a distant second in the shorter race in 51:22. Mark Reed of Duncansville, Pa., was third with a time of 53:11.

Sober, who finished third behind Winebrenner and LaVale’s Lauren MacFawn in her first Rocky Gap Triathlon last year, won the women’s short distance race with a much improved time of 55:31. Max Annika Engel of Silver Spring was second in 58:37. Cumberland’s Becky Gallagher finished third with a time of 59:09.

Goyanko took the lead at about the three-mile mark in the bicycle race after coming out of the water fourth and had a substantial edge going into the run. The 34-year old personal trainer toured the new course in a time of 23:10.16.

Bill Umler of Uniontown, Pa., was second in 2:13.29 and Kevin Owens was third at 2:13.34.

Winebrenner liked having the option of competing in the longer distance this year and was over seven minutes ahead of her nearest competitor with a time of 2:21.53 that placed her ninth overall in the field. Charlotte Walsh of Williamsport was second in 2:28.54, while Nicole Reynolds of Chevy Chase took third in 2:30,41.

“I love running this race and this is just a beautiful place for the event,” said Monseau. “The directors (Larry Levasseur and Karen Smith) did a great job in their first year and I look for this event to just keep growing and growing. I liked changes on the course, especially in the lake where you got to swim outside some of the seaweed.”

In an improvement over his past Rocky Gap wins, Monseau was the first out of the water. Then on a $12,000 bike he received from his sponsor Canondale for his 40th birthday, the Morgantown resident quickly started building a big lead.

Monseau, who has competed in four World Ironman competitions in Hawaii, reached one of his ultimate goals last year when he beat athletes from all 50 states in the Best of USA Triathlon in Tempe, Ariz. He finished fourth in the World Championships in Clearwater, Fla., in November.

Sober added her first Rocky Gap win on her resume with the victory in the Great Allegany Run last October. The 36-year-old personal trainer took the lead early in the bicycle race and then pulled away in the run.

“I did better in all the splits than in my first triathlon last year and I like that,” said the former college All-American in the Heptathlon and 400-meter run at Trenton State College of New Jersey. “I’m not a good swimmer, but I was able to catch everybody on the bike and running is my best part. The weather was perfect.”

Jason Goyanko came to watch and support his younger sister Monica Goyanko compete in her first triathlon. He didn’t know he would end up dominating the men’s international division.

“I have been doing triathlons since I was 13 and this is only my second overall win,” said Goyanko, who had competed in four full Ironman events, including Hawaii in 2007. “This is a really nice course and a nice change from some of the corporate run races.

“I think I was about fourth out of the swim and took the lead about three miles into the bike race,” said the former Radford (Va.) University rugby player. “I was able to build a substantial lead and just ran as hard as I could in the run to keep it.”

Winebrenner said she is hoping to bounce back strong this year after missing part of last season with chronic fatigue syndrome from training too much. The 28-year old Frostburg State graduate has be competing in triathlons for six years after being a three-sport standout in soccer, cross-country and softball at Allegany High School. She was also an an accomplished swimmer in the Cumberland YMCA program.

Winebrenner won an international distance race in North Carolina two years ago and likes the extra distance.

“In the sprint I always felt I had a little extra left in the tank when I got done and I really like his distance,” said Winebrenner, who is back in school in the nursing program at Allegany College of Maryland. “I was third out of the water and I just kept going as hard as I could. I thought overall I ran well.”

Steve Luse is a retired Cumberland Times-News sportswriter. He can be contacted at sluse@times-news.com.