Sometimes an athlete enters a run of form in which everything they touch turns to gold. In recent weeks Nicole Van Der Kaay has given every indication of being in that kind of form. In three races, she has rattled off three wins in Wanaka, Taupo and Devonport. The litmus test of her form now comes with the step up to the World Cup level. To date, Van Der Kaay has won a solitary medal at the World Cup level. That just happened to come at the New Plymouth World…

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All eyes will be on Hayden Wilde this weekend as World Cup racing returns for 2023 in New Plymouth, New Zealand. One year ago, Wilde won the New Plymouth Oceania Cup. That was his first win of a 2022 that catapulted him to a new level in triathlon. Now he returns to face the same New Plymouth course and crowd, with dramatically elevated expectations. Wilde is the clear favourite going into the men’s race. Will he be able to deliver? On the one hand, Wilde is the only male WTCS…

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Alongside the African Cup racing, an African Junior Cup also took place in Nelson Mandela Bay. Men’s race In a field containing twenty-seven South African athletes and three from Zimbabwe, Christian Hattingh led the way in the swim. By the time he arrived into T1, he had a 10 second gap over the next best athlete, Jamie Smuts. Hattingh, though, quickly pulled away from Smuts on the bike and it briefly looked as if he would ride alone. A trio of Shaun Wolfaardt, Louis Terblanche and Kyle Erskine were able…

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After South Africa hosted the first African Cup of 2023 in Maselspoort a few weeks ago, this weekend it was the turn of Nelson Mandela Bay. The athletes took on the Olympic distance in near-perfect racing conditions. Perhaps the biggest hurdle on the course was entering the water on both swim laps as large waves broke upon the beach. Women’s race A small field of sixteen athletes took to the start line. Among those was the winner of the Maselspoort African Cup, Barbara De Koning. De Koning had one of…

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Junior racing returned to Europe for the first time in 2023 with the European Junior Cup in Melilla. Both the men’s and women’s races came before the European Cup that was to follow in the evening. Far from being an appetiser, the Junior athletes provided some compelling racing of their own. Women’s race Prior to the race, we had noted that Margareta Vrablova already had four European Junior Cup wins to her name. With one more, she would draw level with Ivana Kuriackova with the most Junior Cup wins since…

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Time stands undefeated. Days and events and races are rolled upon one another, blurring and meshing together The passage of time, though, leaves its clues. The enclave of Melilla is one such clue. Now an autonomous region, for centuries it was to all intents an purposes a vital colonial outpost for a litany of Spanish leaders, an essential Mediterranean toehold on the shores of North Africa. The castles still stand watching over the bay, gazing across the sea perhaps in memory of a forgotten past. They stand to remind how…

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With the first signs of the Australian autumn and the Antipodean triathlon season nearing its closing stages, the Devonport Oceania Cup doubled as the Oceania Sprint Championships. Those racing from Oceania were eligible for the championships. Meanwhile, non-Oceanian athletes were eligible for valuable World Triathlon points towards their world ranking. Men’s Race In what was a heavily Oceanian field, some of the overseas representation came from the Pertl brothers, Lukas and Philip, from Austria. Lukas Pertl recently won an Asia Cup race in Hong Kong so arrived in Devonport in…

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