The expression on Georgia
Taylor-Brown’s face at the end of the 2022 Championship Finals revealed much
about the strains of a long season in which she had given it everything but,
ultimately, been surpassed by one of the greatest the sport has seen.
At midday on Friday, she will look to
erase that memory as the UAE once again welcomes the world’s most prestigious
triathlon series, and WTCS Abu Dhabi returns to its familiar position on the
race calendar as a hot-and-hard season starter. With Flora Duffy delaying her
own start to ‘23, Taylor-Brown will be among the favourites for the gold when
the action returns to the sprint-distance, F1 circuit course, but the battle
for medals will be intense.
It’s a 750m swim in Yas Marina that
gets the action underway, transitioning to a 5 x 4km lap bike course with
technical turns and rolling hills, before a two-lap run to the first medals of
2023. As always, you can watch the full race live and direct from 2pm local
time over on TriathlonLive.tv.
Can’t keep down Taylor-Brown
Admitting to being heartbroken in the
moment of defeat, Britain’s number one knew that she could not have pushed any
harder for that title in November. Now, Taylor-Brown returns to Abu Dhabi to
get the new campaign underway and chasing the perfect momentum-builder into the
new season.
Since 2019, the 28-year-old hasn’t
finished outside the top two of a Series race, last year’s 3 golds and 3
silvers the kind of form that in any other season would guarantee the title.
Duffy’s absence in Abu Dhabi may take away an external pressure on
Taylor-Brown, but inside she will know that a first gold medal here is exactly
what she needs.
Wearing the number two is Taylor
Spivey, the American with no obvious weakness across the three disciplines but
who has been battling sickness in her pursuit of peak form. Three times
finishing just a place off the podium in 2022, Spivey has plenty of experience
and ice in her veins at crunch time, but still seeks the debut WTCS win that,
like Bergere, could see her kick on to something even more special.
French stars shooting for Paris
Cassandre Beaugrand is one of three
French stars looking to find the big one-day race form that could see them peak
in Paris. Three top 10 finishes here and an eye-catching sprint-distance win in
Leeds last year all point to the possibility of another big display from the
25-year-old, and without the not fully fit Duffy, Maya Kingma or Taylor Knibb
pushing their bike power up front, the Beaugrand run could unlock a third
Series gold.
As for teammates Leonie Periault and
Emma Lombardi, both have Series podiums to their names and both rounded out
2022 in excellent form, their strength across swim, bike and run making them
standout candidates for further French success over a crucial next 18 months to
the Olympic Games.
British duo Sophie Coldwell and Beth
Potter finished 2022 6th and 7th in the world respectively and it was here at
the back of 2021 that Coldwell won her second of three Series bronze medals to
date. Consistently one of the fastest runners on the circuit, Potter has
developed an increasingly potent swim and bike that leave her a major medal
threat once more this year.
Zaferes back with a plus-one
The USA’s 2019 World Champion Katie
Zaferes returns for her first WTCS start as a mother and what will be a
fascinating analysis of where her form and fitness lies after 18 months away
from the blue carpet. The double Olympic medallist was champion here in 2019,
and will find herself in the unfamiliar position of one of the last onto the
pontoon as she looks to build back her ranking and score some first Paris
qualifying points.
Lena Meissner impressed here at the
Championship Finals with a sparkling bronze-winning display and joins an ever
growing list of German athletes regularly in and around the top 10 and ready to
punch through.
As well as Meissner, Lisa Tertsch
found the podium touch in 2022, while the likes of Marlene Gomez-Goggel,
Annabel Knoll and Nina Eim will all be eyeing a solid season starter in perfect
race conditions in Abu Dhabi.
The women’s U23 World Champion Kate
Waugh, Japan’s Yuko Takahashi, Belgian Claire Michel and Spain’s Miriam
Casillas Garcia have all been building up to the new season together at their
training base in Portugal and hit 2023 with fresh targets and Jeanne Lehair
will be eager to get her first full season racing for Luxembourg off to a
strong start.
Women’s WTCS Abu Dhabi
3 March, midday local time
TriathlonLive.tv https://www.triathlonlive.tv/videos/2023-abu-dhabi-wtcs-elite-women?mc_cid=a5e78d4dcd&mc_eid=6139649918
ABOUT WORLD TRIATHLON
World Triathlon is the international
governing body for the Olympic and Paralympic sport of triathlon and all
related multisport disciplines around the world, including duathlon, aquathlon,
cross triathlon and winter triathlon. Triathlon made its Olympic debut in
Sydney 2000, with a third medal event, the Mixed Team Relay, added to the
programme at Tokyo 2020, while para triathlon was first added to the Paralympic
programme at Rio 2016. World Triathlon is proudly committed to the development
of the sport worldwide, with inclusion, equality, sustainability and
transparency at our core as we seek to help triathletes at all levels of the
sport to be extraordinary.
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