The first World Cup of 2024 is zooming into view. As has often been the case, New Zealand will play host to the opening major race of the season. In years gone by, New Plymouth has welcomed elite triathletes to the opener of the World Cup circuit. This year, the race will head over to the east coast of the North Island, to Napier.
Being so early in the year, several athletes may have a few cobwebs to dispel while others will skip the event entirely and start their campaigns later on. With a Sprint distance race on offer, Napier should hold the perfect opportunity to test some early season speed.
Who’s there?
Despite the early date of the race, Napier has attracted an eye-catching field. Leading the way is the reigning women’s world champion, Beth Potter.
Potter did not take on any World Cup events last year. Instead she powered to four WTCS victories. With Olympic qualification sewn up, she will use Napier as a launchpad towards her summer goals. WTCS gold medallist Georgia Taylor-Brown will also be racing for Britain while Sophie Alden and Olivia Mathias complete the team.
Nicole Van Der Kaay leads a ten-strong home New Zealand squad. Of her most notable teammates, Ainsley Thorpe and Brea Roderick will be two to watch. From across the Tasman Sea, eight Australian women will be racing. Emma Jeffcoat, Natalie Van Coevorden and Sophie Linn will be among those looking to start their year with a bang.
World Cup gold medallists from last season, Bianca Seregni and Alice Betto, lead an Italian team of seven women. Verena Steinhauser and Ilaria Zane will likewise be starting.
The World U23 Championships silver medallist, Maria Tomé, will start alongside Melanie Santos for Portugal while America will send a double act of Erica Ackerlund and Gina Sereno. Canada also have two women starting and will be represented by Dominika Jamnicky and Desirae Ridenour.
The Spanish and Belgian teams will be comprised by Cecilia Santamaria Surroca and Marta Pintanel Raymundo, for the former, and Valerie Barthelemy and Hanne De Vet, for the latter. Meanwhile, China will look to make a splash through a trio of Xinyu Lin, Yifan Yang and Siyi Zhang. A Hungarian trio of Márta Kropkó, Zsanett Kuttor-Bragmayer and Zsófia Kovács will also race.
Manami Iijima, the current favourite to claim the Oceania New Flag slot at the Olympics, will be a name to keep an eye on. Other athletes to be the sole representative of their country in the women’s race include Natalia Casas, Paulina Kilmas and Zuzana Michalickova.
Several stars will also be turning out in the men’s race.
Hayden Wilde, the winner of the 2023 New Plymouth World Cup and owner of four WTCS gold medals, leads the home team. Ten compatriots will take to the start line alongside Wilde but the two to watch will be Dylan McCullough and Tayler Reid. As things stand, the pair are locked in a battle to join Wilde at the Olympic Games.
Moreover, Wilde’s closest rival will be racing. Alex Yee is slated to make a rare World Cup appearance and will fancy his chances of besting Wilde on home turf. World Cup winner Hugo Milner will also start as one of the eight British men. In addition, the front-runners to take the second British Olympic slot, Barclay Izzard and Jonathan Brownlee, will get their season started.
Local rivals Australia will look to spoil the day of Wilde and his countrymen. A quartet of Luke Willian, Brandon Copeland, Callum McClusky and Lachlan Jones will toe the start line.
From Spain, World Cup medallists Genis Grau and Alberto Gonzalez Garcia will race, while Hungary will send two World Cup medallists of their own in the form of Gábor Faldum and Márk Dévay
Nicolo Strada, Alessio Crociani and Nicola Azzano make up a fairly young Italian men’s team while Casper Stornes and Sebastian Wernersen balance experience and youth for Norway.
The World U23 bronze medallist, Mitch Kolkman, will lead the Dutch team. His sole compatriot on the start line will be Donald Hillebregt. An Austrian trio of Tjebbe Kaindl, Martin Demuth and Lukas Pertl will also start while Ricardo Batista, John Reed and Gaspar Riveros are among the sole starters for their countries.
Main talking points
Eyes on the relay?
The World Cup will take place on Saturday 24th February and a day later Napier will host a Mixed Team Relay World Series event too. The relay may prove a crucial opportuniy to log points towards Olympic qualifiction and so will form the priority of several teams.
Furthermore, it offers an early chance in the season to fine-tune tactics.
As a result, some athletes may gear their focus more towards the relay than the World Cup.
However, fewer teams have entered than expected. Australia, New Zealand, Hungary, Portugal, Britain, Switzerland, Spain and Italy are due to start. Of those, Italy, Hungary and Portugal are not currently in line to earn Olympic relay qualification. Napier therefore offers an early chance for each to close the gap to Norway. They could even try to catch Spain in the Olympic relay rankings, although Spain will race in Napier too.
Notably, Portugal are only sending one man and two women to the World Cup. With a relay also entered, the question to be asked is who will their second man be?
No Katie Zaferes
After her controversial disqualification from the gold medal at the Vina del Mar World Cup, Katie Zaferes finds herself behind several of her rivals in the world rankings. Crucially, her relative ranking will likely prevent her from starting in the opening rounds of this season’s WTCS.
The third and final American Olympic selection race will be either WTCS Cagliari or WTCS Yokohama and so Zaferes has to get onto the start lists. However, her only realistic chance of improving her ranking to a great enough extent hinged upon doing well in Napier.
Yet Zaferes has opted against entering the race.
Looking forward, then, now only substitutions will realistically get Zaferes onto WTCS start lists before end of qualifying window. Her hopes of going to the Paris Olympics therefore look increasingly dependent upon a discretionary selection. Unless she boosts her ranking soon, final chances to prove herself may be hard to come by.
First Yee-Wilde showdown of 2024
An important caveat has to be noted before we begin. At several World Cups in 2023, Wilde and Yee entered and subsequently pulled out. To see them on the start list is therefore no guarantee that they will actually race in Napier. To take last year’s examples, the opposite is more likely true.
Nevertheless, Wilde actually raced in New Plymouth last year, claiming gold. With the race on home soil, expect him to show up in Napier.
Yee’s attendance remains a question mark. Typically he would not be expected to race at such an event. However, with the likes of Potter and Taylor-Brown also present, it is clear that Britain may be targeting the event as part of its Olympic build-up. Moreover, Yee’s Loughborough training group will take an early season camp in Australia. If he is in the vicinity, perhaps he will actually race.
Should Wilde and Yee show up in Napier, each will have a chance to make an early cut on the other ahead of their looming Olympic battle. Theirs is a rivalry that will likely animate the season and a first non-Super Sprint victory for Wilde could be a major turning point.
Some real swimming speed
One characteristic that makes the women’s start list is how much swimming speed is contained therein.
Last season, Emma Jeffcoat dominated the swim on the Oceania level and can be expected to push the pace in Napier. At the same time, she may not have things all her own way.
The likes of Yifan Yang, Bianca Seregni and Zsanett Kuttor-Bragmayer are all superb swimmers and can take charge of the race. Seregni, in particular, has proven her ability to detonate fields, even over 750m.
Desirae Ridenour will be another fast swimmer to back herself to get ahead early on. As such, the field could arrive in T1 in a very broken up state.
Van Der Kaay’s winning streak
Nicole Van Der Kaay is on a roll. While she logged two top-8 finishes at WTCS races last year, it is her Oceania form that stands out.
Last season, she won two Oceania Cups, two Oceania Championships and a World Cup in her home country. It was a perfect season Down Under. Indeed, the last time she failed to win in Oceania came in April 2022, when she finished 2nd at the Oceania Cup in Taupo. One would have to cast all the way back to 2021 for the last time she failed to medal at an international race in Oceania.
Van Der Kaay also won a silver medal at the New Plymouth World Cup in 2018. She therefore combines success at her home World Cup with an impressive winning streak in the region. Should she continue her form, she may just prove unstoppable, even with the world champion up against her.
You can view the full start lists here.
