An Olympic Sized Question for the Future of Triathlon

Benjamin Eastman

Where is triathlon going? As things currently stand, the Olympic Games represent the centrepiece of the sport, the apogee for athletes that race the Olympic distance and below to aspire to. With the Olympic distance and now the Mixed Relay locked into the Games, World Triathlon has a great foundation from which to continue to grow the sport. The current dynamic, however, creates both a short-term challenge and a long-term challenge. The short-term challenge will be to reconcile the competing demands of the Olympic and Mixed Relay distances. As much…

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How to Qualify for the 2024 NZ Olympic Triathlon Team

Benjamin Eastman

As things stand, Team New Zealand are in line to qualify two men and two women to the Paris Olympic Games in 2024. As with the British and American teams, they will arrive in Paris with a defending Olympic medallist in their ranks after Hayden Wilde won individual bronze in Tokyo. As a result, there is a strong likelihood they will be looking to pick up at least one medal in Paris. Indeed, from their selection policy, it is clear Triathlon New Zealand are gunning for more hardware. How will…

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It Runs in the Family: Elite Triathletes and Sporty Siblings

Benjamin Eastman

Statistically, if you are a younger sibling in a family, you are more likely to become an elite athlete than your older sibling. As a rule of thumb, younger siblings have a training partner that is generally a step further along the developmental path. That gives them experience of playing with, living with and training with someone that is simply better than them, having been born earlier. Over time, the younger athlete can catch the older sibling an often surpass them, although not always. Several studies have pointed to the…

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2000: Triathlon Makes its Olympic Games Debut

Benjamin Eastman

What is now World Triathlon was created in 1989 and held its first World Championships in the same year. It was in the year 2000, though, that triathlon took a quantum leap forward. Having been approved in 1994, triathlon made its first ever appearance at the Olympic Games in 2000 and in doing so entered the big time. Men With a first Olympic medal on offer, much of the men’s field raced sparingly in 2000, opting to put all of their eggs in the Olympic basket. As a result, across…

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How to Qualify for the 2024 American Olympic Triathlon Team

Benjamin Eastman

The other day, we presented the Olympic selection policy for the British team. Today, we are looking at one of their biggest rivals in the Mixed Team Relay: the USA. Read on to find out how the American team for Paris will be picked. After winning a relay silver in Tokyo and the women’s individual gold in Rio and bronze in Tokyo, the American team has grown accustomed to Olympic success. Moreover, before Tokyo, there was some controversy over an in-form Taylor Spivey being omitted from the team. How the…

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Coaching Changes for WTCS Medallists Periault and Rappaport

Benjamin Eastman

Two big names in the world of triathlon recently announced that they will be making changes to their coaching set-up in 2023. Leonie Periault shared that she will be parting ways with coach Stephanie Gros after six years together. In her most recent race finish, Periault came 5th at the WTCS Final in Abu Dhabi. Her best WTCS finishes are her silver medals from Edmonton 2021 and Yokohama 2022. Periault highlighted such high points in her farewell post to Gros and the coaching change marks the end of a highly…

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What to Expect from the Men’s U23 World Champs Medallists

Benjamin Eastman

Last week, we wrote an article identifying six Junior and U23 athletes to watch in 2023. Only one medallist from the recent U23 World Championships made the cut: Bianca Seregni from the women’s field. Meanwhile, we also had an article about the athletes that will be ageing up from the U23 category in 2023 which included the U23 gold and silver medallists from Abu Dhabi, Kate Waugh and Annika Koch. As yet, we have not said anything about the men’s U23 medallists from 2022. All three of the men were…

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How to Qualify for the 2024 British Olympic Triathlon Team

Benjamin Eastman

As we enter 2023, we are only four months away from the end of the First Period in which athletes can score points towards Olympic qualification. The qualifying procedure for how countries get slots at the Olympics has been known for some time. However, just because an athlete qualifies, that does not mean they will be picked for the Games. Instead, National Governing Bodies are in charge of selecting which athletes fill the Olympic slots that have been earned. Every country has a slightly different selection policy and today we…

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Which U23 Athletes Will Be Ageing Up In 2023?

Benjamin Eastman

With each new year, new athletes become ineligible for U23 competition. As they age up, they enter a new phase in their career and some make the step look easier than others. Here, we look at some of the athletes that will be making the step up into the Senior ranks in 2023 and look at what would constitute a successful first year out of the U23 level. Women Kate Waugh (GBR) A good athlete to start with is Kate Waugh. After she won the U23 world title in 2022,…

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2001: Lindley the Star of the Season and Robertson Wins

Benjamin Eastman

Men Only two men won more than one World Cup race in 2001: Simon Whitfield and Martin Krnavek. Both managed to win two races in a season in which eight men won a World Cup. Krnavek had the biggest winning margin of the World Cup season, taking the win at Corner Brook by 27 seconds. Meanwhile, the fastest run split went to Chris Hill, who recoreded a 30:41 in Cancun. At the World Championships in Edmonton, Peter Robertson won his first world title. He was in the middle of the…

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2002: Cave and Rana Fuentes Have Brilliant Seasons

Benjamin Eastman

Men As was the case in 2003, the world championships were the final event of the year. Held in Cancun, the men’s race had a number of strong contenders, with Simon Whitfield leading the way. The only male Olympic champion in the world at that point, Whitfield won the first ever Commonwealth Games triathlon earlier in the year in Manchester. Miles Stewart came home in second, while future Olympic champion Hamish Carter took third. Both Whitfield and Stewart won two World Cups in 2002, as did Peter Robertson. Robertson started…

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The Broken Crystal Ball: Our Improbable Predictions for 2023

Benjamin Eastman

Earlier this week, we highlighted six younger athletes to keep an eye out for in 2023. Maybe those predictions will prove correct, maybe they won’t, such is the nature of making predictions. That got us thinking: what predictions could we make that would almost certainly be wrong, yet would not be impossible? When they ultimately do not transpire, everyone knew they were unlikely in the first place. At the same time, though, they have the tiniest, almost invisible, probability of coming true. As a result, these are our improbable predictions…

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2003: Snowsill’s First World Title and Robertson’s Second

Benjamin Eastman

Men Twenty years ago, the world championships took place Queenstown and were the final competition of the year. Conceptually, this is akin to the modern WTCS and it actually is not that dissimilar to how late the WTCS Final was in 2022. After a long year, consisting of no fewer than 18 World Cup races, the athletes toed the start line in December. The swim did little to break up the pack but on the bike Peter Robertson and Olivier Marceau launched an ambitious breakaway. Together, the pair out-split the…

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6 Junior and U23 Athletes to Watch Out for in 2023

Benjamin Eastman

As we enter the new year, it is time to look ahead to the 2023 season and what it may have to offer. Even based on a cursory glance, one thing is certainly clear: triathlon has plenty of young talent to keep an eye on. Here we highlight six of the names you should look out for this coming season. As a disclaimer, we are not calling the athletes named here the definitive best athletes in the Junior/U23 categories. Instead we are highlighting six that look to have particular promise…

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2004: Carter and Allen Win Olympic Titles in Quiet Year

Benjamin Eastman

Men Due to a combination of regular absences and a lack of a stand-out athlete that could dominate a race, no man managed to win more than one World Cup race in 2004. Dmitriy Gaag won four World Cup medals in the year, including one win. His winning margin was also the smallest of the season, a triumph of 1 second at the Tongyeong World Cup. With the Olympic Games scheduled for August, the World Championships were held early in the year in Funchal, taking place in May. In what…

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