Next month, across 14th and 15th June, the European Cup in Kitzbühel will take place. On the surface, that is not the most groundbreaking news. While Kitzbühel is a former WTCS stop and has hosted the European Championships in times gone by, it is currently one of many events on the European Cup circuit. However, this iteration of the race could prove to be very interesting.
Britain will be sending a full strength team to Kitzbühel. Indeed, it will be a stronger line-up than they recently fielded at WTCS Yokohama. Among the women’s starters, Beth Potter, Georgia Taylor-Brown and Kate Waugh will be racing. Only Sophie Coldwell is missing from the shortlist of likely British Paris Olympians. Meanwhile, Alex Yee will be joined by every male contender to race alongside him in the Mixed Team Relay at the Olympic Games.
Barclay Izzard, Hugo Milner, Jonathan Brownlee and Samuel Dickinson, to name a few, are all slated to start at Kitzbühel.
It is unusual for the British team to send such a strong contingent to a World Cup, let alone a European Cup. At the same time, some of the British team have already raced at one this season. For instance, Waugh and Coldwell raced in Melilla although that was due to the cancellation of WTCS Abu Dhabi.
With no World Cup or WTCS events in June, Kitzbühel may offer a handy opportunity for the British Olympic team to sharpen their race craft ahead of the Games. The only other WTCS stop before the Games (after Cagliari next weekend) will be Hamburg in July. This falls less than three weeks before the triathlon events at the Olympics. Based on the example of 2022, when members of the British team opted out of Hamburg to prioritise the Commonwealth Games, a similar avoidance of the German race could be on the cards this year.
If the British team are going to Kitzbühel, then, there is one important question to ask. Why?
The answer lies in the format. Kitzbühel will be contested over the Super Sprint format. Heats will take place on the Friday and a final will be held on the Saturday. In this regard, the British plan therefore becomes a little clearer. The presence of virtually the entire Olympic team in Kitzbühel indicates that the event will be a trial run for the Olympic Mixed Team Relay.
This is not to say that it will determine who starts in the Olympic relay as other factors will come into it and Kitzbühel probably won’t be definitive. Nevertheless, it will offer a chance to test the distance and show selectors what each athlete has under their sleeve.
Outside of Napier back in February, Britain won’t have contested a relay in 2024 prior to the Games. As such, they need a test, a chance to get a feel for the Super Sprint distance. This is where Kitzbühel comes in.
A counter-point that can be raised to this theory is that what we are seeing is the classic bait-and-switch. British Triathlon in particular are fans of entering the likes of Yee and Potter into every World Cup only to substitute them out and give the slot to a lower ranked athlete. But this is a European Cup. There is no need to substitute to get athletes onto the start list. Right now, there are athletes with a world ranking outside the top-700 that are already on the start list. Anyone with international experience that would have wanted to race in reality would have gotten to had they entered.
Furthermore, the projected Olympians will already be joined by some young and inexperienced athletes. There is no need to substitute out the big names when space exists. The implication, then, is that the slots have not been taken to be given to someone else which means the Paris Olympians have been legitimately entered.
Something is cooking in Kitzbühel and it seems the British team are not missing a trick when it comes to enhancing their relay odds in Paris.
