When it comes to strategy in triathlon, some approaches are rather obvious.
The run-centric approach of using a field-leading run split to win the race is perhaps the most basic way to win a race. Under this strategy, an athlete either has to be with the lead group when they arrive in T2, or at least close enough to the leaders, and then use their running superiority to win the race.
World class exponents of this approach include Alex Yee and Hayden Wilde.
Similarly, the breakaway approach is a recognisable strategy. An athlete must push the pace from the start and trust a superior swim and bike will carry them to victory. Think Sophie Coldwell’s spectacular win at WTCS Yokohama.
A breakaway can also occur early on in the bike, as was the case when Taylor Knibb won WTCS Edmonton in 2021.
If the running race and the breakaway broadly stand as two ends of the spectrum, there are a vast array of tactical decisions that can shape a race between those two poles.
However, we are increasingly seeing the rise of a new strategy, one that lifts from both the running race and the breakaway without quite adhering to either. The problem is that this new strategy is hard to fully categorise. Indeed, it not entirely clear if it is an intentional strategy or more by chance.
With a breakaway, it is obvious what is happening. The same is true when an athletes wins on the run. This emerging strategy is a little different.
It is the swim-run approach.
How it works is simple. An athlete will log the fastest swim (or at least one of the leading swims). Instead of pushing on into a breakaway, they will then ride hard without trying to force the issue. The riding style early on the bike is by no means lazy, but it is no characterised by the aggression and all-in commitment of a breakaway.
As a result, a pack (usually the main pack) is able to ride up to the fast swimmer. The fast swimmer slots into the group and maintains position. Thereafter, they drop the fastest run split of the day to win the race.
There may an extent to which the calmer approach on the bike keeps their legs fresh, certainly when compared to the athletes that are chasing early on in the bike for fear of a breakaway.
It is very much a hybrid strategy, even if it even is one. Maybe some athletes are simply the best at the swim and run. Yet the strategy is spreading, which makes it hard to think it is entirely coincidental.
Cassandre Beaugrand was perhaps the first true practitioner of the swim-bike approach. While there have been athletes armed with fast swims and runs before, Beaugrand put a twist on it.
Take her win at WTCS Leeds in 2022. She logged the fastest swim and the fastest run of the day. In between, she was happy to let the breakaway of Sophie Coldwell and Taylor Spivey ride away, sure that she would run them down.
Her approach was thus both a running race and a breakaway, without the same demands of either on the bike.
Beaugrand essentially did the same to win WTCS Sunderland in 2023, although she was pipped to the fastest swim by Therese Feuersinger and was happy to dabble with a prospective breakaway on the bike before the main pack caught her group. Beaugrand’s win at WTCS Hamburg this year also followed the strategy: swim fast, conserve energy on the bike, then run even faster.
On the surface, Beaugrand could be called a run-centric athlete in strategic terms. However, her swim is too good to categorise her purely in such way. There is something else going on.
The evidence for this new swim-run strategy has been further bolstered this season.
Matthew Hauser won WTCS Montreal using the method. He led out the swim and then followed it up with the fastest run of the day. In between, he rode hard but there was no real attempt to force a breakaway. Instead, he saved his legs and trusted his running speed.
Likewise, Bianca Seregni has won three World Cups this year using the strategy. Of course, World Cup success does not entirely correlate with the WTCS so it remains to be seen if she can transfer her strategy upwards.
In Weihai, Chengdu and Miyazaki, Seregni was the best runner (and even out-ran Gwen Jorgensen in the latter) and was the fastest swimmer at the first two events. It should be noted that Yuko Takahashi claimed the fastest split ahead of Seregni in Miyazaki, by 1 second, although the Italian athlete led for the majority of the swim and stumbled slightly exiting the water.
Typically, unless an athlete can win in more than one way, they never have a choice about how they can win.
Yet the examples of Beaugrand, Hauser and Seregni lend weight to the idea that the swim-run strategy is a choice. One athlete doing it is a freak occurrence. Multiple athletes utilising it looks more like a trend, like they are choosing to execute their races in a certain way.
The swim-run strategy is in a way also an indictment on the state of cycling in the WTCS.
Depending on your stance, the WTCS is either too over-powered on the bike or the cycling is under-developed which is why we so rarely see a successful attack on the bike that changes the race.
As already mentioned, Taylor Knibb won WTCS Edmonton using a long-range on the attack on the bike. However comparable wins are few and far between. Jonathan Brownlee won a silver medal at WTCS Cagliari in 2022 using an attack on the bike but again this was rather anomalous.
In strategic terms, it is rare for anyone to win the race on the bike. Instead, the bike is almost always in service of the breakaway or the running race. In a way, the bike is the great cover of any weakness. The breakaway athlete uses the bike to cover a running gap while the fast runner uses it to mitigate losses in the swim.
Meanwhile, the swim-run approach seems to represent a complete abdication of the bike. For whatever reason, the athletes are too evenly-matched on the bike for a meaningful race-shaping attack to take place. The swim-run answer is thus to not sweat it.
Rather, the goal is to get to the front, hold position, conserve energy and then pop off on the run .
Looking beyond Beaugrand, Hauser and Seregni, someone like Flora Duffy or Dorian Coninx have the speed in the relevant disciplines to use the swim-run strategy. Looking further afield, maybe Georgia Taylor-Brown and Vincent Luis could too.
If an athlete has the talent to control races in a swim-run fashion, maybe it can become a sustainable and viable strategy.
Until there are further instances of the strategy being used, though, the nagging doubt will remain. Is it a real strategy or is it the coincidental swimming speed of a fast runner simply shining through?
