Sporting careers rarely follow a straightforward trajectory. For every sudden rise, there is a plateau. For every dip in form, there is a comeback. In every season there are stories of athletes hitting new heights or reattaining levels of years before.
In this article, we will delve into the biggest improvements in WTCS finish from 2022 to 2023. For reference to the previous year, you can see the improvements from 2021 to 2022 here.
Some of the results represent personal best finishes, the highest that athlete has ever crossed the line in a WTCS race. In other cases, the improvements capture athletes that were rebounding after a tricky 2022. Amid the ebbs and flows of sporting fortunes, though, all rises are cause for celebration.
Women
Rosa Maria Tapia Vidal made the biggest improvement of any woman this year as she rocketed onto a maiden WTCS podium in Yokohama. Prior to Yokohama, she had already logged a personal best finish in Abu Dhabi, improving upon her best of 31st set in 2022. In Japan, she found another level and announced her arrival on the world stage.
Noelia Juan came close to matching Tapia’s improvement. The Spanish athlete turned a previous best of 35th into a 9th place at the WTCS Final in Pontevedra. After a tremendous season, in which she also won a first World Cup medal, Juan has asserted herself as one of the top female Spanish triathletes and is a strong candidate to race at the Paris Olympic Games.
Like Tapia, Annika Koch rode a major improvement in finishing position all the way to the podium. A 28th place in Hamburg in 2022 had been a solid return. A year later, she obliterated that with a top-5 finish at the same venue. Just a couple of weeks later, she went better still as she won the bronze medal in Sunderland.
Whereas the athletes named so far scored personal best finishes in 2023, Nicole Van Der Kaay was an athlete that enjoyed a return to form. A WTCS medallist in 2021, Van Der Kaay had a best finish of 30th in 2022. As it happened, her WTCS medal came in Hamburg in 2021.
In 2023, she bounced back up to 6th place in, you guessed it, Hamburg. Having been her top race in the past three years, look for Van Der Kaay to make another splash in the German city next year.
Jolien Vermeylen was another athlete to record a big personal best finish in 2023. In the year prior, she had not finished inside the top-30. This time round, she made it into the top-10 with a 9th place in Hamburg.
Injuries have been an issue for Amelie Kretz of late but she nonetheless managed to earn an improvement of 21 places in 2023. She missed much of the season and had a best finish of 21st in Yokohama. Given she has finished in the top-8 at a race before (for example, she finished 8th in Yokohama in 2016) there is every chance Kretz improves further still in 2024.
Men
On the men’s side, Max Studer matched the number of places gained by Tapia as he jumped from 35th to 6th. Like Van Der Kaay, his top 2022 and 2023 finishes also came in Hamburg.
At the start of the season, Studer returned to the top-10 of a WTCS race for the first time since finishing 10th in Hamburg in 2020. He placed 9th in Abu Dhabi. As the season wore on, he made further improvements. A possible first WTCS medal remains on the horizon for the Swiss athlete although he has a formidable set of opponents to overcome.
Itamar Eshed converted his previous WTCS best finish of 49th to a 26th place; both results came in Montreal. Next year, Eshed will graduate from the U23 ranks and will look to establish himself further at the WTCS level.
Tim Hellwg was a previous WTCS winner, having taken the gold in Hamburg in 2021, yet he only managed a best result of 20th in 2022. This year, he was back to his best and he very nearly won WTCS Pontevedra. Instead, he was denied by Dorian Coninx in a photo finish and had to be content with the silver medal. Still, an 18 place improvement served notice that Hellwig had ridden through the difficulties of the year prior and made him a bona fide medal contender at future races.
Nicola Azzano and Arnaud Mengal each made improvements of 17 places this year. The former followed the same pattern as Eshed; both his 2022 and 2023 bests came in Montreal. Meanwhile, the latter jumped from 41st in Cagliari to 24th in Sunderland. Mengal also won a maiden World Cup medal in Rome and so can look back over the year with plenty of satisfaction.
Tyler Mislawchuk made the sixth biggest improvement in 2023. As a former WTCS medallist, his 2022 best of 25th was some way off his true capabilities. Two 9th place finishes in the 2023 WTCS re-inserted him into the WTCS top-10 and showed welcome signs that a return to his medal-winning best could yet be on the cards.
