Irish Trio Race Yokohama

Almost one year after the qualifying process was suspended, Carolyn Hayes and Russell White are back on their Olympic quest this weekend in the first of a series of crucial races that will decide their participation at Tokyo 2021.

Both will go up against world-class fields in the Japanese city of Yokohama, which is also hosting a World Triathlon Para Series race in which Mark Millar will line out in the PTWC event.

All three have been in Yokohama since the start of the week and with COVID still very much an issue, have spent most of their days confined to their hotel rooms, only venturing out for essential purposes and training (which has taken place indoors).

For Hayes and White, Yokohama represents the opening weekend in what could end up being a series of six races in six weeks before the Olympics qualification period closes.

Millar Makes Start #3

Still only in his second season, Mark Millar will get to test himself against a very competitive field in the PTWC race on Friday night.

Lining out alongside the Northern Irishman are five times world- and reigning Olympic champion, Jetze Plat (NED) and his compatriot, Olympic silver medalist Geert Schipper.

This will be Millar’s third international start and while he might be relatively new to para-triathlon, he is vastly experienced as an athlete, with three Rásanna, four IRONMAN races and more than a dozen middle distance events under his belt before he was struck from behind by a motorist while on his bike in 2018.

Adapting to para-triathlon has been challenging, as Millar told us towards the end of 2020.

“Triathlon is not new to me by any stretch, but Para-triathlon is just entirely different. It’s just much more technical and hard on the arms, obviously. So training’s different, the racing is different, and you just need to be careful with recovery and stuff that you’re not overdoing it.”

Despite the challenges, Millar has made rapid improvements, setting a host of new PBs in training recently. Yokohama will be a challenging but exciting outing.

Hayes Aims to Hold New Flag Position

Carolyn Hayes heads in to Yokohama holding the ‘European new flag position’ in the qualification rankings for Tokyo. She explained some of what this means and the complicated processes involved in qualifying when we spoke to her last week. Put simply, Hayes needs to maintain her current position relative to the athletes ranked close to her on the Olympic Simulation and she can look forward to returning to Japan later in the summer.

As World Triathlon states in their preview of the elite women’s race, rarely has a campaign opener carried so many layers of intrigue and importance to so many. Saturday’s women’s field is absolutely stacked and Hayes is far from the only athlete with Olympic qualification in her sights.

White: A Simple Calculation

For Russell White, the situation is extremely complicated but the calculation is simple. White is ranked in 55th position out of 55 athletes on the men’s  Olympic Simulation – but told us last month that instead of racing defensively, his plan is to approach the race on the front foot, in the knowledge that beating the athletes ranked close to him on the list gives him the best chance to moving up.

The men’s starting field includes stars like Vincent Luis, Jonathan Brownlee and Kirstian Blummenfelt but with a strong swim-bike and a run that’s hit new highs in training over the spring period, White looks well set.

Watch It Live

Start times are:

• 10:50pm Friday night for the Para Series race
• 02:16am on Saturday morning for the elite women’s race
• 05:06am on Saturday morning for the elite men’s event.

You can see all the action live or on playback on triathlonlive.tv