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With wall-to-wall television coverage and stats on the 2024 Paris Olympic triathlon events, social-media armchair experts may have dissected everything they could from the comfort of their moms’ basem*nts, but it’s another thing to stand in the Parisian puddles, feel the thumps of the pre-race music, and sense the tension of a race that nearly-could-have-almost-didn’t happen.
The situation surrounding these particular Olympic triathlon events is unprecedented in terms of scope, spectacle, and strain on athletes – which we saw play out on race day.
Veteran European correspondent Tim Heming was on the ground in Paris, not only covering the blow-by-blow events of the races themselves, but also paying attention to the stuff most couldn’t know: Heming spoke to the players involved in the controversial Great Britain team selection before the Games; he stood by the banks of the River Seine during the first canceled swim familiarization, watching the current sweep past, as athletes’ triathlon futures hung in the balance.
Below, Heming quickly reports on not just what happened during these two historic 2024 Olympic triathlon events in Paris, but why, how, and what it all means for the upcoming mixed relay triathlon, occurring in just a few days’ time.
– Chris Foster, Editor-in-Chief, Triathlete
Heming’s Paris Olympic Report: The Women’s Individual Triathlon
Only Alistair Brownlee winning gold on home soil in London 2012 could rival the atmosphere in Paris yesterday.
France took their first individual Olympic medal—earned by one of their golden girls, breaking the tape on the Pont Alexandre III bridge with the backdrop of Les Invalides, in front of the biggest crowd of the Games.
That Beaugrand won wasn’t a surprise, and – had anyone seen her build-up races in Cagliari and Hamburg – neither was how she pulled clear from the three remaining rivals at the end.
What was a shock was Switzerland’s Julie Derron claiming silver. There were rumors heading into the race that the Swiss was one to watch, and lightning-fast half-marathon run splits of 1:12:37 at Challenge Walchsee in Austria and 1:13:22 at Ironman 70.3 Switzerland June raised eyebrows at what was possible.
But despite being a former European champion, her short-course resume didn’t set us up for what we saw yesterday, especially knowing a draft-legal Olympics is an entirely different story.
The Swiss have long punched above their weight in Olympic triathlon though: It started with Brigitte McMahon’s golden success in Sydney 2000, and more recently Nicola Spirig’s gold and silver in London and Rio, respectively. With six medals, only Great Britain has won more.
It will be interesting to see where Derron, who spent the first four months of the year training in southwest China in Yuxi, goes from here.
The women certainly had the more challenging bike course, where wet conditions meant the Parisian roads looked more like trying to pedal on an ice rink than asphalt and cobbles.
But as the first to set off, the women were also the guinea pigs for the men’s race. As such, the women’s start was a mess. A bleep, followed a second later by a horn, left a number of triathletes rooted to the pontoon.
It appeared that because of the wall of noise created by the fans (and with swim caps no doubt tightly in place), many couldn’t hear the initial sound. After Tokyo’s boat-gate, an issue at the start was the last thing the organizers wanted. Thankfully, it was rectified and the horn was removed from the men’s race that went off without incident.
Finally, we heard almost as much about the current as the water quality in the build-up, but guess what: We didn’t lose any athletes downstream. Actually, the current made for a “better” swim – especially in terms of trying to break the race up. It was a few minutes longer sure, but to see Flora Duffy pick her lines upstream on her fifth Olympic appearance and climb the steps to T1 to roll back the years only added another layer of color to an already impressive spectacle.
Heming’s Paris Olympic Report: The Men’s Individual Triathlon
Have you seen the helicopter shot of Great Britain’s Alex Yee overtaking Hayden Wilde in the last few hundred meters of the run?
That footage, along with the rivals-and-sometime-roommates camaraderie, arm draped over shoulder on the blue carpet, will go down as the hallmark visuals of this race.
“Yeeeee”
– Alex Yee as he passed Wilde probably.#Paris2024 pic.twitter.com/DvjTaL82Sz
— Joshua Bell (@The_Inside_Word) August 1, 2024
As New Zealand’s Wilde wilted within sight of the blue carpet, Yee looked like he was using a Zwift PowerUp to turbo-boost past his rival. It’s hard to oversell how much of an achievement pulling 14 seconds back over a mile-and-a-half is at this level. Even Yee could scarcely believe it.
“It all happened so fast,” he said, having taken the tape before realizing what exactly had happened. “I wish I could go back and do it again, but I just got to the finish line and was like: ‘Oh my days, it’s me!’”
Heming’s Paris Olympic Report: Predictions for the Mixed Team Triathlon Relay
If anything has changed with regard to the Paris Olympic mixed team relay – that will wrap up the triathlon program on Monday – the clearest message is: If the French looked like narrow favorites before the individual action, now it’s a head scratcher to imagine how anyone could beat them.
Beaugrand will no doubt be on the anchor leg and was in such frightening form yesterday that their rivals can now only pray to have a big enough gap on the newly-crowned Olympic medalist before she dives in for the final 300m swim on Monday.
But where will that gap come from, when the likely trio preceding her will be Leo Bergere, Emma Lombardi, and Pierre Le Corre? A bronze and two fourth places in the individual competition – with not a weak discipline in the bunch.
Maybe the hometown interview roadshow that Beaugrand has had to do post-race saps her energy somewhat, but that’s unlikely, and even if it happens, then Leonie Periault could step up as a more-than-adequate replacement as a late birthday present (Periault turned 30 on race day yesterday).
Sure, there’s a case to be made for Team GB, but even reigning world champion and individual bronze medal-winner Beth Potter is struggling to crack the code on Beaugrand’s current form.
And what about the Americans? No point in sugar-coating it, this is where the mixed team relay either caps an objectively miserable Olympic triathlon experience, or provides a silver lining (actually a bronze lining would be a triumph at this point).
The individual races told a sad tale for the heralded U.S. team: After being caught the wrong side of the break, Morgan Pearson was apoplectic at his competition’s race tactics (as evidenced in our bleep-worthy, emotional post-race interview); with transport woes adding to the stress, a disappointed Taylor Knibb told me she would never stay in the Olympic Village again. (This, after a very forgettable Olympic cycling time trial experience only days prior.)
Kirsten Kasper also hit the deck on the slick roads multiple times, and in the end Taylor Spivey was best placed in the individual events in 10th – although she mentioned to me post-race that her better chance would probably have come in Tokyo.
But maybe adversity can fuel the fire.
As long as the water quality and current pass the tests, we will find out on Monday.
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