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Exciting Developments for 2019 Welsh Sprint Championships

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Welsh Triathlon are excited to announce new developments for the 2019 Sprint National Championship, changes that could see the landscape of domestic National Championships change in the future.

After discussions between Welsh Triathlon and the home nation federations over the last 12 months, Welsh Triathlon are looking for greater alignment of the National Championship programme and making a more exciting and competitive edge to these events.

The Welsh Sprint Triathlon National championships are to be held at the SWYD Barry Island event on the 26th May 2019, and will pilot these changes.

The Event Organisers, All or Nothing events have made a number of changes to their successful 2018 route. The bike course for part of the day will be a closed road circuit, enabling the event to be selected by British Triathlon as a draft legal qualifier for the ITU world championships in Edmonton 2020.

As a result, Welsh Triathlon have decided to pilot it’s 2019 Sprint Championship as a Draft Legal event. This will allow members of Welsh Triathlon to compete for the Welsh National Sprint Championship within their respective age category, as well as a spot at Edmonton as part of the Great Britain Age Group Team within the same race. With a stronger race field likely to be in attendance across each category due to the qualification element, this will make the National championship event more competitive raising the standards.

With the new pilot in place this will also see the creation of a ‘Team Wales National Champions’. This team will then be invited to represent Wales at the British Sprint Championship in Nottingham on the 15th June 2019. The Welsh National Sprint Champions from each age category and gender, have the opportunity to wear a Welsh National trisuit and ‘Race for Wales’ in their age group category against other Home Nations athletes in Nottingham.

Events Officer Gareth Evans stated

 “This is a a great opportunity for Welsh Triathlon Age Group Athletes. With ITU guidance resulting in the British Championship becoming draft legal, the fact that we can facilitate a Draft legal sprint championship in Wales allows us to pilot the representative team concept”. Evans continued “We’ve been looking at ways to improve the importance of our National Championships. The fact that this event is an ITU qualifier will raise the bar as far as standard is concerned. From the feedback Welsh Triathlon have received, there’s a clear passion within the triathlon community to ‘wear the dragon’ and compete as a ‘Welsh’ athlete, so if this can be filtered across our National Championship events in time, it will certainly add extra impetus to these events”

 

This will only be piloted at the Welsh Sprint Championship in 2019. Traditionally, the Welsh Championship events have been non-drafting, so Welsh Triathlon will be facilitating ‘draft-legal racing workshops’ across the country in the new year.

The Barry event will still have a non-drafting element for those participants who are new to the sport or who aren’t comfortable drafting, but these waves will be run after the draft legal bike legs are clear.

The final details of selection for the ‘Welsh Champions Team’ at Nottingham will be released in the New Year. What will be crucial though is that if you have aspirations to be part of the inaugural Welsh team, please ensure that you

  • Are a valid member of Welsh Triathlon (click here for membership)
  • Are registered for the Draft Legal Element for the SWYD Barry Island Sprint Triathlon on the 26th May (If you’re unsure, please contact the event organiser)
  • You keep the weekend of the 15th June free for the British Sprint Championship at Nottingham

 

If you have any further questions regarding this programme, or would be interested in sponsoring this new initiative, please contact Gareth Evans on garethevans@welshtriathlon.org

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