Karlovy Vary Preview

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The Course

Karlovy Vary is one of the most demanding courses across swim, bike and run on the World Triathlon circuit. Before anyone gets to the bike with its 15% climbs, cobbled streets and sharp downhill corners, there is the swim with 9 turns in addition to the re-entry at 750m and 2 sections of gravel racing around an island and under a bridge. The run with multi changes of direction, road surface and gradient through the old town tops off the visual delights of the course with a grind to the finish. 

Despite the shallow man made lake this has been a wetsuit swim 5 out of 6 previous World Cups but the nature of the course creates a very long string of athletes with numerous gaps to be closed, or not, as the race progresses.

Team Ireland Athletes

Russell White goes there with a good history in the race, including his best result of 2nd in 2018. In an attritional race, there has never been less than 13 DNFs in the World Cup era, the ability to hold a pace and simply keep putting one foot in front of the other can make all the difference and White has shown repeatedly he can do just that over his career. With a 13th and 19th already in the bag, the last leg of this late summer trilogy is his hardest on paper, with a race rating of 33 and 19 of the worlds top 100 on the start list. I don't imagine he is expecting to return to the Podium but a solid race, finishing strong would be more than enough back up what we have seen in the last month and to show further improvement is on the way. 

The Competition

Morgan Pearson, Max Studer and Gabor Fuldum recently went 6, 11 and 12 in the Test Event in Paris while Lasse Nygard Priester arrives after 2 podiums in 2 weeks. Fuldum is incredibly consistent but Pearson and Studer with the outright speed in the race if they get into position. Hidden lower down the start list Sam Dickinson could be worth an each way shout having been 7th here last year when he went on to 3rd in Tongyeong a month later.

Recommend anyone with some time to look at videos of the bike course with this onboard footage for Morten Hansen particularly good. https://youtu.be/V6k5BDK7uiI?feature=shared

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