Julie Derron was nothing short of imperious as she won the Chengdu World Cup. Wearing number 1, she had arrived as the pre-race favourite and sought to cap a lengthy training block in China with a win. However, her race was thrown out of kilter before it even got going.
Derron did not have a bad swim. Neither, for that matter, did most of the field. Yet practically every athlete was made to look like they were swimming through treacle in contrast to the smooth speed displayed by Therese Feuersinger. The Austrian athlete claimed an early lead with Zuzana Michalickova on her feet, but gradually cranked the pace higher and higher and higher.
At the end of the first swim lap, Feuersinger’s lead stood at 24 seconds. A lap later, it was over double as she exited 50 seconds ahead of Wen Wei. In many ways, Feuersinger was channelling Bianca Seregni’s aquatic dominance from her win in Chengdu in 2023. Having earned a massive lead, the question remained over what Feuersinger would to with it.
Further back, Tilda Månsson logged perhaps the best swim of career and emerged 2 seconds down on Wei in a group containing Alice Betto, Roksana Slupek, Michalickova and Derron. Over the first bike lap, a chase group of six athletes halved the gap to Feuersinger as the leader sensibly did not attempt to solo the entire race.
Derron led the chasers as she reassembled her scrambled race plan and had Alice Betto, Ilaria Zane, Anne Holm and Roksana Slupek for company. Most intriguingly, Månsson was also in the chase quintet.
The Swedish athlete had won the Wollongong World Cup a week prior, but had not yet had much of a chance to establish her credentials over the Olympic distance in her nascent career. If her swim was a slight surprise, it was equally a shock to see her ride so comfortably with the likes of Derron.
The chasers caught Feuersinger on second lap and consolidated a lead of 40 seconds lead over the next pack. This main chase group contained threats like Maria Carolina Velasquez Soto, the silver medallist in Wollongong, Nicole Van Der Kaay and Lisa Perterer. Even with the firepower in the chase group, they were powerless against the leaders.
Holm nipped ahead into T2 with a smart move at the end of the bike but it was Derron that carried the early lead during the run. The Swiss athlete ran with Betto and Holm following. Månsson, having enjoyed a near-perfect race so far, hung a little further back.
The gap to the chasers stood at almost 90 seconds but that was evidently not enough for Derron. First she pulled clear of all bar Slupek. Then, at the end of the opening run lap, she dropped Slupek too. In doing so, she managed to extend her lead of the likes of Van Der Kaay and Elizabeth Bravo, the fastest runners in the chase pack.
On the second lap, Derron had the unusual experience of racing with the lapped Tereza Zimovjanova. The Czech athlete started to run away from the Swiss for a spell but that did not matter. At the midpoint of the race, Derron led Slupek by 16 seconds and Månsson by 19 seconds and could afford to let Zimovjanova go… if only for a minute or so.
Derron would come roaring through the second half of the run to secure a huge victory. Although her spot on the Swiss Olympic team still has to formally rubber-stamped, there is almost no world in which she will be left at home. Based on this most recent evidence (and her WTCS form in 2023), she is shaping up to be a possible dark horse for a medal.
While Derron ran away to the gold medal, the race for silver and bronze remained alive. Slupek had recorded a great run in Wollongong a week prior to take 6th place, although a mishap in T2 in Australia had put her on the back foot and forced her to burn energy catching leaders before losing out in the final sprint finish. After a run of Continental Cup victories over the winter, she could smell a first ever World Cup medal.
Yet Slupek had Månsson glued to her. In the end, it was the Swedish athlete that prevailed in their final-lap tussle. In doing so, Månsson took her first medal over the Olympic distance. If she could afford to be quietly confident of locking up Olympic slot after her win in Wollongong (which lifted her into one of the final qualifying slots provisionally), her silver medal will see her rise even higher in the Olympic rankings. Moreover, having backed up performance in Wollongong with one of the best swims and bikes of her career, Månsson’s ongoing evolution will be one of the major talking points from Chengdu.
In turn, Slupek earned the bronze medal. She had finished 4th at the Haeundae World Cup in 2021 but now finally made the final step up to the podium. After an injury-hit 2023 and a blistering start to 2024, it was a big moment for the Polish athlete.
Zane then led Betto home to complete the top-5. As with the men’s race earlier in the day, the whole top-5 came from the breakaway.
You can view the full results here.
