It was a little under four months out from the real thing, but some of triathlon’s leading lights got a new taste for racing on the streets of Paris ahead of this summer’s Olympic Games.
At the ASICS Festival of Running, WTCS medallists Leonie Periault and Annika Koch were among those to race. Periault took on the 10km while Koch stepped up to the plate over the 5km. Confronting the triathletes were top quality fields of established world-level runners.
In the women’s 10km, Periault dropped a time of 32:29, earning 7th place. For reference, her compatriot, Emma Lombardi, produced a time of 32:28 over the same distance on the road earlier in the year.
Meanwhile, Koch ran 16:43 over the 5km to place 23rd. At WTCS Sunderland last summer, Koch claimed the bronze medal, narrowly pipping Periault who settled for 4th place. In doing so, the German athlete prevented a French sweep of the women’s podium (after Cassandre Beuagrand took gold and Lombardi secured the silver medal).
On the triathlon front, Koch has yet to start her season and has no international events lined up in the coming month. Periault got her triathlon season going with a 4th place finish at the Lievin World Cup. Like Koch, she has no races planned in the next month. Expect both, though, to appear when the WTCS resumes with stops in Yokohama and Cagliari in May.
After Periault’s performance in Paris, in particular, the two women will be ones to watch in the third discipline.
