Europe Triathlon

“The 2012 season has come to an end.

“It has been an intense racing season, full of highlights across the Triathlon world, reaching a climax in London with an outstanding Olympic event. European athletes performed at their best: 3 Olympic podiums in the Men’s race and 2 in the Women’s.

In the World Championship rankings after Auckland, European athletes had all 3 podium positions for the Men’s race and 1 podium in the Women’s race.

Congratulations to all athletes and National Federations for these great achievements.

One of the most encouraging outcomes from this season is the number of European National Federations present at the London Olympics.

There were 21, compared to Sydney (17), Athens (18), and Beijing (22). It is an impressive number compared to the other Confederations and shows that we have a lot of potential, although we can certainly do more.

Our ITU President Marisol Casado is working hard within the IOC to secure another medal for our sport in the mixed relay event at the Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, to increase the number of athletes taking part, and hence, to increase the number of Federations present on the pontoon for the mixed relay.

We have had our ITU contribution for Development doubled.

The Executive Board has finely tuned a Development Program with a focus on helping all National Federations.

Priority is given to those National Federations situated in Category 2 and 3 to help them to achieve Olympic Qualification status.

It is a medium to long term program and a letter was sent to all National Federations last week.

To be effective, everyone’s collaboration is required and I invite all National Federations to answer the questionnaire that is attached to the letter by mid January.

This will allow us time to evaluate the data received and to address this subject face to face during the Presidents’ Conference on the 15-17 February (an official invitation with all the details will be sent out shortly).

Our goal is to have almost all programs approved by the end of February 2013. We will be offering small financial help to cover some of the travelling costs for Federations in categories 1, 2, 3, according to the document presented in Auckland.”

For more information on the Presidents’ Conference, please contact Kathleen Smet, Secretary General, on etu_hq@etu.triathlon.org