After Alex Yee was voted the favourite to take the win in the men’s race at the Paris Olympic Test Event, Cassandre Beaugrand has been determined as the women’s favourite to an even more decisive extent.
The French athlete claimed a whopping 57.6% of the vote.
With two straight WTCS wins to her name, she is in wonderful form. At both WTCS Hamburg and WTCS Sunderland, she was a class apart and will arrive in Paris with her confidence soaring. Given how much emphasis the French federation have placed on the Test Event and the upcoming home Olympic Games, it is reasonable to expect the French athletes to unleash their biggest performances of the year.
Meanwhile, Flora Duffy and “someone else” both came away with 14.1% of the vote.
Duffy is the reigning world champion and has won her past three WTCS races. The issue is that those events came last season and she has not raced in 2023. At her best, she can take down virtually anyone over any style of race. The lack of recent data points, though, means that there is a slight risk that picking Duffy is based on where she has been at not where she is now.
At the same time, Duffy has previously overcome serious injuries and returned to the top level of triathlon with a bang.
Among those that can be classified under “someone else”, Emma Lombardi and Taylor Spivey stand out having both earned two WTCS medals this season. Lombardi finished 2nd in Cagliari and Sunderland while Spivey claimed 3rd place at both Abu Dhabi and Cagliari.
Taylor Knibb is another that could strike from the “someone else” cohort. Her last WTCS win came in Edmonton in 2019. On her day, though, she can single-handedly turn a race on its head and ride away from the field.
The likes of Leonie Periault, Rosa Maria Tapia Vidal, Laura Lindemann and Summer Rappaport could also threaten having won WTCS medals this season.
Beth Potter took the next largest share of the vote with 9.8%. Seeing as she won WTCS Abu Dhabi and WTCS Montreal and is the other woman alongside Beaugrand with two wins in the Series in 2023, she may have been a little underrepresented in the figures.
Potter made the breakaway in Abu Dhabi and has lethal running speed to boot.
Sophie Coldwell then took the smallest share of the vote with 4.4%. Coldwell earned a silver medal behind Potter in Abu Dhabi and went on to win in Yokohama. In the injury-enforced absence of Georgia Taylor-Brown, Coldwell is the only woman starting to have won a WTCS race over the Olympic distance this year.
A multitude of rivals therefore await Beaugrand in Paris. Right now, though, there is plenty of confidence on her ability to seal the deal.
