The success of that first event was proved when Salford won the right to hold the National Triathlon Championships in 2001 - attracting 1000 competitors from all over the world, including a host of big names for the elite races, like Simon Whitfield and Leanda Cave.
Having a closed city centre course is very rare and lets athletes go right into the heart of Manchester - creating a fantastic atmosphere between them and the spectators.
"Those national championships also proved to be an important rehearsal for the Triathlon events at the 2002 Commonwealth Games in Manchester - which ran over the now tried and tested course.
Over 100,000 spectators lined the route to view one of the few free Games events and the atmosphere they created was amazing as Simon Whitfield and Carol Montgomery raced to gold!
[1] The event was not held in 2008 because of its proximity to the Olympic Games, the absence of BBC Sport coverage, and major building work (part of MediaCityUK) close to the area usually used for transition.