Category: Analysis

With several prominent absences in the men’s field and an evenly-matched trio of 2023 winners in the women’s race, WTCS Montreal was always likely to come down to fine margins. That ultimately proved to be the case as the contenders were gradually whittled down over the course of the race until Matthew Hauser and Beth Potter struck clear to win the golds. To go with the breakdown of the splits from Montreal, in this article, we take a broader overview of the dynamics of the race. The Swim Vittoria Lopes…

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Swim In the women’s race, Vittoria Lopes picked up where she left off in Cagliari and clocked the fastest swim. Her time of 8:48 was super fast; even if the course appeared to be a tad short, it was a real show of speed from the Brazilian. Lena Meißner was next out in 8:50. After fast swims at WTCS Abu Dhabi in 2022 and 2023, she made her return to the front of the race after a spell out with injury. Meißner’s swim has really found a new level over…

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Debuts When it comes to the debuts at WTCS Montreal, there is one obvious place to start. Maria Carolina Velasquez Soto was the standout among the new faces as she recorded a 10th place finish. By way of comparison, in 2021 and 2022 only three women were able to hit a top-10 at their first race in the WTCS. They were Lucy Charles-Barclay (5th, Leeds 2021), Kate Waugh (9th, Hamburg 2021) and Emma Lombardi (4th, Yokohama 2022). Velasquez is therefore a part of a very select group in recent WTCS…

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What does the data say about each athlete on the start line at WTCS Montreal? To provide a little insight, we have prepared the below cheat sheets with all the key information you need for the men’s and women’s fields. Note that, in contrast to the last cheat sheet for WTCS Cagliari, this time round the data shown applies for Sprint races in 2022 and 2023. In some cases, athletes have a preference for the shorter distance so it makes sense to highlight the most relevant data points. For every athlete, you…

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WTCS Montreal will be held over a short and fast course that could play into the hands of a number of athletes. Whereas the race last year was held as a series of Super Sprints, with qualifiers and a final, this year’s event will be contested over the Sprint distance. Despite the switch in format, the course in Montreal shares a lot of characteristics with that of last year. 2023 Route 2022 Route Across the above graphics, you can see how large swathes of the 2022 course have been carried…

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By the slimmest of margins, Dorian Coninx is the new Series leader in the men’s WTCS. He nudged his nose 3 points ahead of Vasco Vilaca, the previous leader, after yet another top-5 finish. Across his three appearances this season, Coninx has mustered results of 5th, 4th and 4th. A first podium of the year beckons; with the likes of Alex Yee and Hayden Wilde closing in, though, as well as Vilaca and Leo Bergere, Coninx will need to land on the podium if he is to defend his lead.…

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The Debuts WTCS Cagliari was not the easiest day to make a debut. The nature of the course made it easy to be lapped out and that is ultimately what happened to Garabedian and Peszleg. In making her first appearance in the Series, Garabedian became the first athlete from Cambodia to race in the WTCS. Prior to this year, Garabedian had represented France and she made her first start for her new country back in March. With her new nationality, Garabedian is expanding the frontiers of the sport. Hopefully her…

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WTCS Cagliari brought two fascinating races as Alex Yee and Georgia Taylor-Brown repeated their 2022 victories at the venue. Here we dive into the exact details of the race and the numbers behind the results reveal plenty. Swim Men The most obvious takeaway from the men’s swim distribution is how the peak concentration of athletes exited the water around 15 seconds after the fastest swimmer. As a result a large front pack was able to coalesce during the first bike lap. Although there was a split in the field in…

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WTCS Cagliari will take place over the same course as that used in the previous iteration of the race in October. Last time out, there was enough in the course to enable breakaways in both the men’s and women’s races. In the men’s event, Jumpei Furuya used a late attack to gain a gap. Jonathan Brownlee then bridged across and the duo defended a small lead into T2. Meanwhile in the women’s race, the Taylor Knibb train broke up the field on the bike. Neither the swim nor the run…

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You’ve seen it for WTCS Abu Dhabi and for WTCS Yokohama. Now get ready for the start list cheat sheets for WTCS Cagliari. In a slight change from the previous cheat sheets, this time we can include data from the 2023 season. The information below therefore covers Olympic distance races from the 2022 season plus WTCS Yokohama 2023. As such, the data points exclusively focus on the relevant distance which is the event to be raced this weekend. For cases in which an athlete did not race over the Olympic distance…

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