Tokyo Olympics Triathlon – Fancy an Outsider!
If asked your favourite triathlete to take an Olympic podium at Tokyo, you may well feel justified in shouting out names such as Vincent Luis, Alex Yee, Kristian Blummenfelt or Flora Duffy, Katie Zaferes, Georgia Taylor-Brown.
Nevertheless, triathlon racing is a myriad of constantly changing variables that makes the sport so unpredictable and frustrating in equal measure as to make it almost impossible to predict a winner. It’s little wonder that sometimes the form book can go out of the window and a rank outsider wins the race.
When assessing a favourite for the race it’s important not to just take the previous victories at face value; you have to dig a little deeper and put previous finishing positions into context. Winning a particularly race is just a plain number and often doesn’t tell the full story. Just because an elite athlete does not regularly win races or finished eight last time out, shouldn’t immediately mean you dismiss their chances at Tokyo.
There is a lot more to bear in mind, not least the course layout, climate and environment all of which hold their own unique characteristics that can make or break an athlete.
Take Alex Yee as an example: one of the fastest runners on the triathlon circuit as exemplified in his impressive performance at WTCS Leeds being the only athlete to run sub-30 minutes (29.46) which puts him in fine form to go to Tokyo as a favourite to win Gold. And yet, Yee ran a sub-30 in Yokohama in May in a time of 29.49 but never made the podium and back in 2019, again at Yokohama, he ran 29:58 but came home in fifth place in the energy sapping heat of Japan.
Triathletes are not machines; results cannot be guaranteed, all of which means a ranked outsider with a neat row of duck eggs in ranking points may well pull off a shock win in Tokyo. To this end, below are few ‘dark horses’ to keep an eye on who may not be seen as podium contenders but, nonetheless, can beat the ‘best of the best’ on their day.
Podium Contenders – Men
Tyler Mislawchuk will compete in his 2nd Olympic Games having been officially selected to represent Team Canada. In his Olympic debut at the Rio Games in 2016, Mislawchuk finished 15th in the men’s individual race, running with a stress fracture in his leg. This time round he will be injury free and setting his sights much higher.
Over the week-end, Mislawchuk took victory at the Americas Triathlon Cup, Long Beach, Cali. proving he’s in excellent shape heading into the Olympics. He is on fire in more ways than one, as a pattern is emerging that he wins in the most intolerable heat and humidity environments, which will bode well for him in Tokyo where the heat will be the principal enemy for many of the athletes.
In 2019, before the pandemic hit the sporting world Misawchuk was in excellent form winning three major triathlons including his history-making performance in August 2019 in Tokyo, becoming the first Canadian to win an Olympic test event
Fresh from an extended training block in Hawaii and victory in the last action of the Olympic Qualification period, accomplishing, a second successive World Triathlon Cup Huatulco gold to his name, Mislawchuk will be looking to emulate Canada’s Simon Whitfield’s memorable gold in Triathlon’s Olympic debut at Sydney 2000.
Fernando Alarza: In a Spanish team consisting of sporting legends namely five-time ITU World Champion Javier Gómez Noya and triple world champion Mario Mola both now in their 3rd Olympic Games it is not surprising that one of the more experienced athletes riding high in the World Triathlon Series, Spain’s Fernando Alarza’s in not on the tip of everyone’s lips for a podium finish. Yet, in 2019 he finished fourth in the overall rankings thanks to a brilliant run of seven top-10 finishes including a superb Grand Final bronze.
Alarza’s first taste of success was beating GB’s Tom Bishop to be crowned Junior World Champion at the 2010 ITU Grand Final in Budapest. Just two years later Alarza scored a top 5 finish in the WTS Stockholm before claiming second in the 2012 U23 World Championships in London.
It was in 2015 that Alarza’s racing all came together and he became a regular fixture in the WTS top ten. Earning seventh place in Abu Dhabi and Gold Coast, fourth in Auckland and second again in London, the Spaniard followed up with an even stronger season in 2016, bagging his first WTS gold in Cape Town, one of six podium places across the next two years. Bronze in Yokohama was Alarza’s highest WTS placing in 2018 on route to finishing the year ranked sixth. Following on from his previously highlighted 2019 success Alarza won the 2020 Spanish Sprint Triathlon Championship in a pilot time-trial race after the pandemic lockdown.
Alarza will be fighting for the medals face to face with the greats of this sport. Be under no illusions he has the pedigree to take a podium spot.
Podium Contenders – Women
Alice Betto: The Italian Alice Betto is a former under-23 and Elite National champion and a seasoned competitor on the world stage. Alice Betto came second in the Tokyo test event and fourth in the WTS Grand Final that made up her five top ten performances she offered in 2019. This shows she continues to be a player in the sport’s biggest races. Betto grew up as a competitive swimmer and has a great passion for cycling two ingredients that have served her well over her long athletic career.
Italy’s Alice Betto has been racing at the Elite level since 2010, announcing her arrival with a top 10 finish in the U23 World Championships in Budapest. A first Elite World Cup podium came in 2013 with silver in Alicante, before narrowly missing out on a World Series podium in London for the second successive year. The 2017 WTS Leeds saw Betto hit her first WTS podium, this time in Leeds, and after another fourth place at WTS Montreal in 2019, the Italian capped the year with an excellent silver at the ITU World Triathlon Olympic Qualification Event in Tokyo.
The triathlete from Cavaria, was deserving to compete in London 2012 and Rio 2016 Games for the performances offered, but she was always forced to forfeit due to injuries which prevented her from fulfilling this dream. Finally, at the age of 33, she will have the chance to make this dream come true, to which the icing of a medal may well be added.
Maya Kingma: With an Olympic ranking of 30th Maya Kingma of the Netherlands will not be on everyone medal contenders list. The Dutch women, however, is a beastie on the bike. There will be no ‘sitting in’ to conserve energy, the Tokyo technical bike course will suit her down to the ground, as exemplified in her 3rd place at Yokohama in May, where she and Knibb (USA) broke away on the bike decisively in a manner that suggests she would be comfortable trying to match Duffy if a similar scenario played out in the streets of Tokyo.
The Dutch athlete’s Achilles heel has generally been her running ability but this may have been put to bed with her impressive win at the WTCS Leeds where she ran her way to victory over the chasing British pair of Learmonth and Coldwell. Kingma’s run times at Yokohama and Leeds appear to be 4 to 5 minutes quicker than in 2019.
We often talk about ‘Mind-Set’ and it may well be Kingma’s fascination with the working of the human mind having a Masters in Cognitive Neuroscience and the use of visualization techniques have allowed her to find the run legs to get past the barrier of being unable to take the run from the front.
By her own omission she cannot believe that she finds herself top of the world rankings two races in. In her current form and with the right mindset she could well outperform her expectations in Tokyo and become the new ‘Queen of the Netherlands’. Definitely one to watch!
