As noted in the cheat sheets for WTCS Hamburg, the racing will take place over a Super Sprint distance as opposed to the more traditional Sprint course.
On what was already a tight route on narrow streets, there will be several precarious spots.
The biggest talking point is the swim.
Hamburg is notorious for what happens under the bridge during the first discipline. Under the cover of darkness, there is plenty of contact, some of it unintentional, some of it not.
With the athletes due to spend around a quarter of the 300m swim under the bridge, there is good reason to expect what can best be termed shithousery and shenanigans to transpire.
The smaller start lists may negate some of the worst aspects of being under the bridge. After all, each heat should have around half the athletes that would normally start so space should not be an issue.
Yet the darkness will offer all sorts of cover for “innovative” tactics.
Conscious of the dark arts of the Hamburg swim, World Triathlon have released the following footage from the race briefing;
While the swim is the most obvious place to lose time, the bike also has several moments of risk.
The athletes will take on three pancake-flat laps. On each lap, however, there are two dead turns. In addition, there are plenty of tricky corners to navigate. It can therefore be easy to lose momentum on the course. The more technically skilled riders should be able to put their opponents under pressure. Yet it will only take one corner taken at speeds a little too high for someone to hit the ground.
There is also a chance of rain in Hamburg on Saturday which could make the corners particularly challenging.
The run is perhaps the safest element of the race. There is no real risk of fighting for position, nor is there a threat of a high-speed crash. Instead, the athletes will take on two laps of a flat course.
The question throughout the weekend, then, will be when to attack on the run. A late kick in the last couple of hundred metres will probably be the favoured tactic but there could be something to be said for attacking straight out of T2.
As a result, Hamburg has two sides to it. At one end of the scale, it is flat, short and a fairly tame course. On the other side, though, there are plenty of points in which an athlete can come unstuck.
