🕷️ Kieran McPherson doesn’t do excuses. Adversity comes with the territory in endurance sport and the XTERRA World Cup campaigner is one of those ‘let your results do the talking’ types.
But seriously, the Matamata off-road triathlete has had more misfortune in the past year than some do in a lifetime in the sport.
Strap yourself in.
From a sporting perspective, it all started in January when the 33-year-old came round a blind bend on a downhill to be confronted by a tree that had fallen across the trail. McPherson responded quickly, as elite mountain bikers are want to do, but over-corrected slightly and slammed head first into another tree standing to attention. The impact cracked his helmet and the “heap of skin” that parted itself from a shin smarted too. A lot.
In February, the entire left side of his body swelled up when he received not one, but 12 (!) whitetail spider bites at home in Matamata. Then, at the Asia Pacific Champs in Western Australia the following month, McPherson lost more skin, this time on an ankle. The bites, bumps and grazes combined led to serious infections and a round of IV antibiotics.
Finishing runner-up at Dunsborough, by a measly eight seconds to Aussie Benjamin Forbes, added a little venom to the real pain as winning the continental crown had been one of his three major goals for the year.
McPherson pulled out of XTERRA Rotorua in early April due to the infections but was still at Blue Lakes, hosting a bunch of European friends who race on the global circuit. And yes, you guessed it, he couldn’t even catch a break sitting on the sidelines.
“I picked up the flu just before flying out to Greece…”
Add 30 plus hours of travel to Vouliagmeni and it’s hardly surprising McPherson was off his normal pace at the 2nd round of the XTERRA World Cup. He still managed to finish 9th and nab invaluable series’ points but, wait, there’s more…
Hoping to get his season back on track at round three at the Weston Park estate near Birmingham in early May, McPherson was instead forced to DNS after suffering concussion following a heavy recon ride crash at 45kmh. It came on lap two when a fence line that wasn’t present during his first practice circuit caught McPherson off guard.
It was yet another chapter in a catalogue of calamity that McPherson had kept private. As he says, “…I am not really a big fan of publicly making excuses.”
That he’s reached the halfway stage of the 2025 XTERRA World Cup in 5th place in the men’s standings, helped no end by 4th in both the full distance and short track races at last weekend’s round at Oak Mountain in Alabama, speaks volumes of McPherson’s resilience.
He’s needed it in spades both as an athlete and as a family man in the past year with his mother sadly losing a brave, two-year battle to cancer last December.
It’s here where we need to rewind further for added context.
You set the foundation.
You were the glue.
I will always be proud to be your son.
Thank you for being my mother.
❤️ 5/12/61 – 3/12/24 ❤️
Rest in peace.
With a green light from his close-knit family to drop a few of his daytime jobs, McPherson went all in on the pro life in 2024 despite the challenges at home. With a few solid months of training, he quickly climbed from 12th in the World Cup standings to 5th and was mixing it with the leading European and American campaigners.
Everything was going swimmingly until a call beckoning him home from last July’s round in Quebec, Canada. McPherson quietly stepped away from the circuit to be with his family and mother who was sadly in the final stages of outliving her diagnosis. The fight perhaps gives hint to where Kieran gets some of his humble tenacity from.
Typically, he deflects the spotlight from himself, instead heaping praise on two other precious women in his life, wife Morgan and coach Val Burke. Having his father travel as part of Team McPherson in 2025 has also helped him overcome whatever fresh hurdle he’s encountered this year.
“I can’t thank my wife and my coach enough for allowing me to get to the start line and I am happy to be able to reward my team with a result we are capable of,” McPherson told SBR-Tri.com after Oak Mountain.
“My coach has been my rock since I left the world series last year after Quebec to return to NZ to be with my mum when she got sick. She has always picked me up, listened and we have really worked well as a team.”
After a week visiting his American wife’s family in Colorado, McPherson will return to New Zealand for a training block he hopes will help him climb to a top three finish come the end of the XTERRA World Cup season.
That would tick off at least one of his three main goals for 2025 after he also finished runner-up in last weekend’s duel North American Championships by just over two minutes to American world No.7 Sullivan Middaugh.
Middaugh claimed the full distance silver medal behind Frenchman Felix Forissier in Pelham, Shelby Country before the pair traded podium places in the short track race the following day.
McPherson, 12th in XTERRA’s latest ‘World Performance Index’ (read world) rankings, has dual NZ-US citizenship, thus his eligibility to race for two continental titles.
He’s accentuating the positives of his duel within a duel with Middaugh as well after coming out of the water at Oak Mountain just outside the top 10 and with much work to do on trails muddied by weeks of rain and a fresh early morning thunderstorm.
“The first third of the bike on the single track, I slowly picked off riders in terrible conditions to reach the front three before the open trail. I hung on for dear life knowing that if I could remain in contact through the middle strength-based sections, I would be okay for the last sections of single track back into transition two.
“Five riders came into T2 together, but my running legs didn’t show up and I faded to 4th. After the Asia Pacific Champs, where I posted the equal fastest run split after getting lost, I know I can rely on this in future races if I can get off the bike fresher.
“I am happy and given that I am only just starting to come back into good health, I have high hopes for the rest of the season.”
Will you focus on anything in particular with coach Burke in the block before the World Cup resumes in the forests of Lac Delage, Quebec on July 12?
“We’re looking at a whole lot of calculated risks,” McPherson explained.
“We have some pretty big, bold ideas when it comes to training and Val and I communicate and structure that in a way so we can get the most out of my body.”
With the cobblestones of Prachatice, Czech Republic (August 9-10), Zittau in Germany (August 16) and the September 25 short track decider under the shadows of the mighty Dolomites in Molveno, Italy to come, McPherson is going to need his battered body to co-operate to achieve his top three goal.
A little luck wouldn’t go amiss either. He deserves that if nothing more.
XTERRA World Cup #4 – Oak Mountain
Full Distance
Swim 1500m / Bike 33km / Run 10km
Men
🥇Felix Forissier (FRA) – 2:29:13
🥈Sullivan Middaugh (USA) – 2:29:43
🥉Sebastian Need (GER) – 2:31:34
Also NZL
4. Kieran McPherson 2:32:05 (20:50 / 1:29:42 / 39:58)
Women
🥇Alizee Paties (FRA) – 2:48:49
🥈Aneta Grabmuller (CZE) – 2:53:06
🥉Romy Spoeler (NLD) – 2:53:24
Short Track
Swim 400m / Bike 7.5km / Run 3km
🥇 Sullivan Middaugh (USA) – 35:20
🥈 Felix Forissier (FRA) – 35:37
🥉 Federico Spinazze (ITA) – 35:47
Also NZL
4. Kieran McPherson – 35:54 (05:42 / 18:29 / 10:20)
Women
🥇Alizee Paties (FRA) – 40:33
🥈Marta Menditto (ITA) – 41:42
🥉Romy Spoelder (NLD) – 42:50
World Cup Standings – Top 10
Following XTERRA Oak Mountain (May 19, 2025)
Men
1. Arthur Forissier (FRA) 416
2. Michele Bonacina (ITA) 378
3. Sebastian Neef (DEU) 369
4. Felix Forissier (FRA) 367
5. Kieran McPherson (NZL) 316
6. Benjamin Forbes (AUS) 306
7. Federico Spinazze (ITA) 286
8. Jens Emil Sloth Nielsen (DNK) 265
9. Sebastien Carabin (BEL) 206
10. Scott Anderson (DEU) 176
Women
1. Alizee Paties (FRA) 550
2. Marta Menditto (ITA) 370
3. Aneta Grabmuller (CZE) 306
4. Hannah Lee Young (AUS) 304
5. Lorena Erl (DEU) 264
6. Emma Ducreux (FRA) 237
7. Romy Spoelder (NLD) 212
8. Solenne Billouin (FRA) 149
9. Elizabeth Orchard (NZL) 147
10. Maeve Kennedy (AUS) 136
Ed’s note: In a earlier story featuring McPherson, SBR incorrectly stated the final round of the XTERRA World Cup in Molveno doubled up as the XTERRA World Championships. While both the world title and World Cup will be decided at the venue in Italy, the World Championships will be fought over the Full Distance on September 27, two days after the World Cup decider over the short track distance.
