The first taster of Super-Sprint action in Hamburg took the form of two men’s qualifiers for Saturday’s three-stage finals, 30 men in each, the top 10 going through, the remainder into the two afternoon repechages with just five berths available from each.
The short-swim tactics, pontoon position and double-tunnel set-up made for a dramatic 300m opening salvo, and it was Canada’s Brock Hoel steaming through to transition in heat One, Gianluca Pozzatti (ITA) tucked in behind.
There were 28 athletes together for most of the bike, Jonas Schomburg and Yee pushing the pace into T2 along with Tjebbe Kaindl, the likes of Manoel Messias and Tyler Mislawchuk on the cusp of the top 10.
Kaindl suffered on the run and began to save legs for the repechage, ahead it was Jacob Birtwhistle and Antonio Serrat Seaone joining the likes of Vasco Vilaça and Jelle Geens into the Finals.
Heat Two was dominated early on by Matt Hauser after a strong swim saw him clear, Hayden Wilde struggling in the water but soon back up among the leaders after the first bike lap.
Csongor Lehmann was going well too, with Tim Hellwig also flying early on, but it was Max Studer making up impressive ground early on the run to make sure he was sistting safely inside the ten.
In fact there was clear daylight between that lead ten and the 11th-place Joao Perreira, who didn’t manage to recover from a tough swim and switched to setting his sights on the repechage, ahead Blummenfelt making 100% sure of his safe passage along with Miguel Hidalgo (BRA) and Marten Van Riel (BEL).
Full results available here.