The women’s race at the Vina del Mar World Cup saw one of the most dramatic finishes of the season. However, the excitement of watching one former world champion (Gwen Jorgensen) hunt down another (Katie Zaferes) in the final kilometre while Tereza Zimovjanova battled to hold on to a best ever World Cup finish was soon dwarfed by what happened next.
In a shock move, four of the top-5 finishers were disqualified from the race. At the end of the first of the two run laps, the leaders took the wrong path through the transition area. A combination of unclear markings and the route of the lead motorcycle made for a confusing situation and the error was made.
During the race, the commentary team speculated that they could be penalised for the mistake, although disqualification did not seem like a prospect. That soon changed.
A lengthy delay in confirming the results followed as the appeals came in. When the dust settled, the four leaders had been disqualified.
Zaferes therefore lost out on a first world-level win since her triumph at WTCS Lausanne in 2019. Zimovjanova was deprived a best ever World Cup result; her 2nd place would have improved on the bronze medal she won in Tongyeong a month ago.
Moreover, Anna Godoy Contreras had matched her previous best World Cup result of 4th (a feat she managed in Weihai in August) while Mathilde Gautier had logged another top-5 result. Both, though, she their performances struck from the record.
On a personal level, the loss of the results, particularly after each produced such entertaining displays, will sting. On a more practical level, it will also result in lost points towards world rankings and Olympic qualification. In addition, the element of lost prize money has to be considered, as well as the sudden waste of a trip all the way to Chile.
Each of the quartet can thus feel particularly hard done by.
On the flip side, several athletes benefitted from the disqualifications. Gwen Jorgensen was promoted from 3rd to 1st place, handing her a fourth World Cup win of the year. Likewise, her teammate Gina Sereno was bumped up from 6th to 2nd.
Vicky Holland also moved up onto the podium, taking 3rd place after originally finishing 7th.
Even without the disqualifications, all three of Jorgensen, Sereno and Holland had positives to already take from their race. Holland, for example, had a fantastic swim to put herself with the leaders. Having only made her first international start back following a maternity break in October, it represented a major step forwards for the former world champion.
Across the board, there were a number of terrific performances and it would be a shame for the subsequent controversy to cloud the multitude of bright points in Vina del Mar.
At the same time, the disqualifications are a reality and cannot be swept under the rug.
To the letter of the law, the officials were correct in identifying that Zaferes, Zimovjanova, Godoy and Gautier took the wrong route at the end of the first lap. Course infringements resulted in other contentious disqualifications at WTCS Pontevedra and the World U23 Championships. Esteban Basanta Fouz was disqualified in the latter while Miguel Hidalgo was disqualified in the former, although that was overturned upon appeal.
World Triathlon therefore has recent precedent when it comes to such disqualifications.
Nevertheless, the clearly unintentional nature of the offence as well as the inadequate race course markings could have warranted some kind of consideration. Perhaps a time penalty would have been a better punishment for what was a fairly minor offence.
That would still have changed the final finish order but would not have robbed the athletes of their respective podiums and points.
Of course, it would have been tight to issue a penalty for the athletes to see before the finish. Had they then not served it, they would have been disqualified anyway. Such a fate memorably befall Vetle Bergvsik Thorn at WTCS Hamburg this year.
The advantage gained by taking the wrong route is also near-impossible to quantify. Did it genuinely affect Jorgensen’s chances of winning the race? It is hard to say for sure.
One line of thinking would be to applaud World Triathlon for the strict enforcement of their rules. It was a bold call to stick with the disqualifications but the officials chose to apply the rules.
On the one hand, it is reassuring to see the application of the law, showing that they are not simply meaningless words, as well as a semblance of consistency following the Pontevedra examples. On the other hand, it is hard to escape the feeling that there is an overly litigious and stringent streak to current set of rules.
Penalties and disqualifications are always a grey area and people will always have different interpretations. Vina del Mar, though, is the latest example of a fairly frivolous rule having a big impact.
Hayden Wilde dropping his swimming hat at WTCS Pontevedra yielded a 15 second penalty and potentially played into him losing the world title. Wilde was similarly hit by a penalty at the 2022 Commonwealth Games which denied him a shot at the gold medal.
On the flip side, Flora Duffy was issued a penalty at the 2022 WTCS Final that was quietly scrubbed away without explanation.
The overriding sensation, though, is that triathlon has become rather punitive for rather irrelevant items. Late attendance to a race briefing earns a penalty. Not correctly storing helmets in transition does too.
Obviously World Triathlon want to ensure the safe storing of equipment and punctuality at their briefings, although there are not a lot of other sports that let something outside of the race determine the outcome of the race. If World Triathlon’s time is so sacred, perhaps a fine will suffice rather than encroaching upon the race itself and compromising the product.
Meanwhile, swim behaviour is still not policed to a satisfactory degree in the eyes of many active WTCS athletes. Instead, the window dressing of correct helmet placement and routes through transition have taken primacy.
One conclusion to take from Vina del Mar, then, is that at least World Triathlon are effectively policing, albeit in a somewhat over-zealous manner.
However, the controversy surrounding the disqualifications is unlikely to abate any time soon.
