Category: Interviews

With three WTCS medals last season, Beth Potter had a great 2022. Throw in her bronze medal at the Commonwealth Games and she possibly had as good a year as she could have hoped. However, the highs of the past year precipitated a mirroring low over the winter. Sickness proved a problem. Contracting COVID at the WTCS Final in Abu Dhabi undermined her race and perhaps cost her third place in the 2022 Series. Then a bout of flu in January put her out of action too. Amidst the turbulence…

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After a difficult end to her 2022 season, Summer Rappaport bounced back in style by taking 4th place at WTCS Abu Dhabi. In Abu Dhabi, she was one of the fastest swimmers before riding as part of a six woman breakaway. Already, she has surpassed her best WTCS result from last year. Indeed, Abu Dhabi was her best finish since taking bronze at WTCS Hamburg in 2021. 2022 proved to be a tricky year for Rappaport as illness and injury hampered her. Injury was a particular problem in the last…

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There are few athletes in the World Triathlon Championship Series with as much speed as Nina Eim. From her teenage years, she has track personal bests of 8.08 over the 60m and 26.15 over the 200m (both indoors). It is not only uncommon for an elite triathlete to come from such a sprint background. Eim possesses a level of sprint speed that many in the men’s field would quietly envy. Indeed, she might be among the most lethal triathletes in a sprint finish. Eim’s closing speed was on display in…

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Dorian Coninx smiled as he reflected on his first race of the year. A 5th place finish was a good way to open his account for the season. “It went very well for me,” he said. “It was smooth from the beginning to the end and I was very happy with my race. It was nice to start the season like that as Abu Dhabi has not always been great for me.” His past five races at Abu Dhabi included three DNFs and a highest finish of 37th. Relief was…

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They say to understand someone, you have to walk a mile in their shoes. While he did not quite make it to a mile, Matthew Mcelroy may have gleamed a little from the life of Gabor Faldum after trying to wear his shoes in T2 at WTCS Abu Dhabi. Mcelroy became a father in December and the stresses of looming parenthood make people do strange things. Racking your bike in another athlete’s slot, dropping your helmet in the wrong box and reaching for someone else’s shoes might be a little…

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Miriam Casillas was 18 years old when she arrived in Madrid. Born and raised in Badajoz in the south-west, she arrived in the capital to fulfil a childhood aspiration of becoming a doctor. In doing so, she would follow the footsteps of her mother and, at that time, the road ahead seemed set. Casillas, though, just so happened to also be a talented triathlete. In 2011, she won the World Junior Cross Triathlon Championships held in her home region. When she arrived in Madrid, then, she was also invited to…

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There’s something about Kenji. Popular among athletes and fans alike on the WTCS circuit, it is hard to escape the feeling that Kenji Nener has been around for a while yet is also only just arriving. In 2021, he enjoyed the twin peaks of a 14th place finish at the Tokyo Olympics and a first top-10 in a WTCS race by taking 9th in Abu Dhabi. “There’s no doubt 2021 was the high of my career,” said Nener. Those successes, however, preceded a deep lull. At the end of 2021,…

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Hayden Wilde joined our call on a cold Belgian morning, with a positive COVID test on his mind and uncertainty over incoming rain. If nothing else, it was a far cry from the intensity of the WTCS Final in Abu Dhabi just one week prior. His positive test has forced him to actually rest and take a semblance of an off-season. After four days, he’s already bored. As much as he has the prospect of a European Christmas and skiing to look forward to, sitting still does not really seem…

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For most viewers of the WTCS Final in Abu Dhabi, trying to keep up with what was happening and the permutations of every move was no mean feat. To commentate on the races in real-time, and doing so in the Abu Dhabi heat, was an entirely different proposition. That challenge was taken up by three-time Olympian, Helen Jenkins. In 2021, Jenkins became a more consistent part of the World Triathlon commentary team after sporadic commentary experiences towards the end of her career. Abu Dhabi, though, presented one her of her…

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On the surface, it would be easy to think Miguel Hidalgo is in a hurry. As the only man born in the 21st century to be currently ranked in the top-40 of the WTCS, he is one of the future stars of the sport. Indeed, he has been on the rise for some time now. At WTCS Montreal in 2021, Hidalgo was almost the first man born this century to achieve a top-10 finish at a WTCS race. On that day, he took 11th. In 2022 he improved upon that…

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When the athletes took to the start line at WTCS Bermuda, the moment was even more special than usual for Jeanne Lehair. Unlike the rest of the 2022 season, she did not race in the ITU tri-suit. Instead, for the first time, she wore the colours of Luxembourg. Lehair said, “I had been waiting for this moment for months now so I was really happy to finally race with the lion on my suit!” For a year, she had waited after making the change from racing for France to Luxembourg.…

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Among the several outstanding performances at WTCS Bermuda last week, one of the best came from Roberto Sánchez Mantecón of Spain. In a breakout performance, he took the bronze medal. “It is special to make a podium, and also to share it with another Spaniard,” said Sánchez Mantecón on his first ever World Triathlon Championship Series medal. “Our country badly needed such a result after the great time we had before Covid.” After a solid swim, Sánchez Mantecón ended up in the main pack, around 40 seconds down on the…

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