Wednesday will see the mountain bikes wheeled out for the first of the cross action at the World Triathlon Multisport Championships Ibiza and it’s a spectacular off-road course that awaits in San Antonio.
The opening 5.8km run, in the cross
duathlon, will take the athletes through the lower forest before coming out
onto the rocky waterfront, providing some tricky trainer terrain requiring full
attention as they head back along the coastal paths towards transition.
Onto the bikes, the climb takes in a
variety of surfaces, obstacles and ramps before things take a turn into the
upper forest where the contrast between snaking dirt tracks and rubble-strewn
rocks will test the very best of them. Two laps and 20km later, there’s another
rocky 3km run to the tape.
Carina Wasle will lead the line for
the women’s race, the experienced Austrian who fell in love with the sport on
this very island racing back in 2007. Since then she has hit countless major
multisport titles including European and World at cross and winter, testament
to her nimble but gutsy racing style.
Slovakia’s Kristina Lapinova has also
competed here before but in 2018 when she won the European title. Also with
experience at winter and long distance triathlon, narrowly missing the podium
in Targu Mures last year will certainly add fuel to her fire this time around.
Ukraine’s Fofiya Pryyma has shown
versatility of a different kind with an Arena Games debut last month and U23
Aquathlon world silver in 2022, as well as U23 European Cross Triathlon gold
here in 2018. She will face strong competition again from Portugal National
Champion Pauline Vie and home favourite Eva Garcia Gonzalez.
Netherlands’ Diede Diedericks and the
newly crowned Winter Duathlon World Champion Julie Meinicke (NOR) will also be
sensing this could be their year.
Belgium’s Thibaut de Smet comes into
the race as favourite after his impressive win in 2022 as an U23 athlete. Now
24, his bike power and ability to dig deep could be decisive on Wednesday.
Teammate Sebastien Carabin finished in second in Targu Mures and will surely
back his run if he can stay in touch with his compatriot over the 2-lap bike.
The Italian Alessandro Saravalle is
another who successfully straddles winter and summer triathlon and duathlon
with regularity and will relish the tougher bike segments, much like fellow
Italian Giuseppe Lamastra.
Nicolas De Smet will want to try and
get the measure of his brother, the U23 champion still very much breaking into
the sport but has proven fearless on the bike and rapid on the run at Bilbao
2022.
For the full Cross Duathlon World
Championships start lists, click here.
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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