Mark Buckingham had a breakthrough result in Yokohama, Japan, finishing fourth in the ITU World Triathlon Series race. His best previous result in the Series was 15th, also in Yokohama, in 2013.

To finish fourth in a field that featured Alistair Brownlee, Javier Gomez and Mario Mola was an excellent result for Mark, who turned 30 earlier this month.

He said: “I finally got a WTS result that I'm happy with. British Triathlon have been great in supporting me for the last four years, it's a long process and I've got a lot of people to thank.”

He added: “Jonny and Alistair have been a massive help since I moved to Leeds, so I owe a lot of this result to them.”

Mark came to triathlon in 2010 through the trigold scheme, he’s now based in Leeds full time and funded through the UK Sport World Class Performance Programme. He was previously a track steeplechase athlete, and finished fourth at the 2006 Commonwealth Games trials behind Adam Bowden.

Bowden also had a good result in Yokohama, finishing seventh. For the fifth year in a row he finished inside the top ten, demonstrating remarkable consistency.

Both Buckigham and Bowden will feature at the Rio test event in August, and Bowden will appear at the next round of the ITU World Triathlon Series in London on Sunday 31 May. The elite men's race is at 3pm followed by the women's at 4:45pm.

Full report and results from Yokohama here.