Double-Whammy for World Ranked No1 – Flora Duffy!

Bermuda’s Commonwealth champion and two-times former World Champion Flora Duffy is suffering a double-whammy as she reveals double pain of injury and US red tape. Flora Duffy’s season could be at an end after the superstar triathlete revealed that she has been beset by a combination of injury and American red tape. Duffy recently ranked no1 in the 2020 World Triathlon rankings (alongside Britain’s Georgia Taylor-Brown) was expected to be in Spain for the Valencia ITU Triathlon World Cup last weekend, which Britain Beth Potter remarkably won, but was a mysterious no-show.

However, in a recent social-media post, she explained that she has been suffering with a right knee problem since not long after her stunning triumph at the Arzachena World Cup event in Italy — a second successive gold medal at that level. Duffy posted on Instagram “really out the blue, I woke on a Monday and felt some acute inflammation at the back of my knee. After 3 easy days I got a second opinion from @ferranabat (thanks for the recommendation @janfrodeno). He arranged an MRI, and by the next morning removed a good bit of fluid with a syringe. Thankfully the bone and tendon seem not too serious. And mostly it was two cysts applying pressure that was causing the pain”

It was after Duffy got the cysts drained after a second opinion that she withdrew from the Valencia World Cup event as a precaution. The MRI results suggests her recovery period will be quick. 

This is not the only setback Duffy has had to contend with, as she is still awaiting clearance to be able to fly back to the United States so that she can take part in the Professional Triathletes Organisation 2020 Middle Distance World Championships at Daytona International Speedway from December 4 to 6. Duffy explains her predicament “We were meant to fly to Boulder on Sunday, but had not yet received our needed NIE clearance,” she said in her post. “An additional approval needed for travel between Schengen states and the US since the March 23 presidential proclamation is still in effect. We got one previously within 72 hours. It has been three weeks. So bitterly frustrating and destabilising.”

For Duffy the injury is not now the only cause for her uncertainty in racing the PTO championships, as she exclaims “Now only have three weeks before the PTO. But still waiting for the e-mail confirmation of the NIE. Do we pack? Do we stay? Do we just call it a year?”