Europe Triathlon

In an incredible run of success, both winners from Belgrade have consolidated their points winning run, with two golds and one silver medal each in their past three ETU races. Their performances have greatly boosted their individual Junior ETU Rankings. 

FEMALE RANKINGS

MALE RANKINGS


Horváth has also given her own Nation a solid injection of points to hang on to second place behind Italy.

With the end of the season fast-approaching, the excitement is indeed mounting.

But how did the races go?

The top-ranked athletes were all in the mix as they made their way to T1. It was Hungary’s Gergely Kiss who led, with Denis Kolobrodov RUS, just ahead of Andreas Carlsson. They led a huge line of wetsuit-wearing athletes into Transition who, with varying degrees of success managed to get their wetsuits off, helmets on and then to set off on the bike.

Two packs formed and in that leading group, the stronger runners were able to conserve some energy over the 20k course before attacking on the run.

Carlsson found some fantastic pace and took command over the final 5k run, taking the win in style and adding his second gold medal in two races to his collection. The win takes him right to the top of the Junior Men’s Rankings. The silver medal was fought for in a cat and mouse battle between Kiss and newcomer, Fynn Batkin GBR, who has been steadily gaining experience since his arrival on the scene in Loutraki last year at the ETU Youth Festival.

Alongside Kiss, Hungary claimed three more places in the top ten but their best performance was still to come and as the Junior Women lined up, the excitement grew.

Hungary’s Karolina Helga Horváth has delivered some great results this year. A gold in Bled and then  the silver in Zagreb last weekend has shown that she is on fire. She and her teammate, Marta Kropkó led the swim but Kropkó lost valuable time in T1. Despite this, the leading group of cyclists was a big one and Pia Totschnig AUT in her last season as a junior had managed to power her way into that leading peloton.

Taking it really carefully on each turn, desperately trying to avoid skidding out on the turns, the pack stayed together and as the athletes set off for the run, it was going to be the final 5k where the fireworks would happen. Horváth had the pace and ran easily to take the win and to secure joint second place in the Junior Women’s Rankings. Poland’s Julia Sanecka raced well to secure silver and Totschnig crowned her racing as a Junior with a well-earned bronze.

As in the men’s race, Hungary collected points by the armful, with a total of five athletes in the top ten.

Click here for the video highlights.

We are waiting for the official photographs and as soon as they are sent, we will publish on the ETU Facebook page.