With the fourth round of the 2025 WTCS, the Series is jumping from the new to the old. From the new terrain of Alghero, the racing now heads to the classic venue of Hamburg. The streets of the northern German city have hosted a WTCS race in every season since the Series’ inception, including as the single day world championship in 2020, making it unique on the calendar. Indeed, there has been a world-level race there every year since 2002. Considering the weight of history attached to it, a gold in Hamburg means just that little bit more. Find out which men will look to etch their names into the history books and gain ground in the world title race below.
Who’s there?
The current Series leader Matthew Hauser goes again and will attempt to defend the gold medal he claimed last time out in Hamburg. The winner of this year’s Yokohama stop, Hauser’s lowest finish in the 2025 Series has been 2nd place and all signs point to another strong result. Joining him on the Australian team will be Luke Willian, Callum McClusky, Brandon Copeland, Brayden Mercer.
However that is not to say Hauser will sail through Hamburg untested. He more than anyone knows the danger Miguel Hidalgo poses after the Brazilian athlete’s barnstorming maiden Series win in Alghero. With Manoel Messias also racing, himself a WTCS medallist including twice over the sprint distance in 2023, the Brazilian duo bring an awful lot of speed to the party.
2023 world champion Dorian Coninx heads up a French trio that also includes Tom Richard and Yanis Seguin. A multiple WTCS winner, Coninx has the swim to rival Hauser and Hidalgo and carries a sprint finish sharp enough to defeat practically anyone in the sport. Similarly, Vasco Vilaca, the bronze medallist in Abu Dhabi at the start of the season, starts for Portugal alongside Ricardo Batista and Miguel Tiago Silva. Thrice a medallist in Hamburg already, Vilaca is another top candidate for the podium.
Among the home contingent, Henry Graf will be one to watch. He pulled out Yokohama and Alghero but few can forget his early season form in which he placed 4th in Abu Dhabi. The presence of Lasse Lührs, a WTCS medallist and Olympic champion in the relay, will further bolster a German quintet that also contains Lasse Nygaard Priester, Eric Diener and Valentin Wernz.
Over the sprint distance, speed will be the name of the game and arguably no one can match the 5km running speed of Spain’s David Cantero del Campo. He was the quickest man on foot in Abu Dhabi but his challenge will be to live with the early pace likely to be set by Hauser, Hidalgo, Coninx and more. The Spanish team is packed with fast runners with WTCS medallists Antonio Serrat Seoane and Roberto Sanchez Mantecon starting as well as World Cup winners David Castro Fajardo and Alberto Gonzalez Garcia.
Further running prowess can be found in the American cohort with World Cup winners Reese Vannerson and John Reed pencilled in to start alongside Darr Smith, Chase McQueen and Sullivan Middaugh. Moreover, the 2022 World U23 champion Connor Bentley will start for Britain alongside Ben Dijkstra, Max Stapley and perhaps the only man that can truly rival Cantero in the third discipline: Hugo Milner.
WTCS medallist Csongor Lehmann will race with Gergely Kiss and Márk Dévay under Hungarian colours. Meanwhile, Japan will have a four-man team in Hamburg with Kenji Nener, Ren Sato, Aoba Yasumatsu and Takumi Hojo all racing.
New Zealand (Tayler Reid, James Corbett and Saxon Morgan), Canada (Tyler Mislawchuk and Charles Paquet) and Italy (Alessio Crociani and Euan De Nigro) will also hope for high finishes from their athletes. Last but not least, among the solo acts for their respective countries are Vetle Bergsvik Thorn (NOR), Simon Westermann (SUI) and Mitch Kolkman (NED).
Who’s not there?
Alex Yee and Hayden Wilde are still out, while the French pair of Pierre Le Corre and Leo Bergere have opted against racing after starting in Alghero. One other noteworthy absence from the home team is Tim Hellwig, who won the 2021 edition of the race.
Four talking points
Hauser vs Hidalgo
The rematch is on after the May clashes between Hauser and Hidalgo. Each claimed one win apiece and now occupy the top slots in the Series rankings. For all their similarities – both are particularly strong in the swim and run – their respective wins highlighted a key tactical difference between the two. Whereas Hauser chose to attack late in Yokohama, Hidalgo preferred to launch his attack straight away on the run in Alghero. Hauser’s late surges are a pattern for him and so it will be interesting to see whether Hidalgo’s emergence forces a change.
For Hidalgo’s part, after his Alghero victory, he took on T100 Vancouver. We will therefore see whether the longer format will hurt his preparation for the sprint distance event in Hamburg. Then again, the shorter format has usually favoured Hidalgo; his initial breakout in the Series actually came over the sprint distance in Leeds back in 2022.
From World Cup to WTCS
One athlete to watch closely in Hamburg will be Reese Vannerson. The American will be making his WTCS debut but arrives with a reputation that belies his age after winning the Chengdu World Cup. The race in Chengdu was actually his first ever standard distance race and so making such steps up seems not to trouble him too much. Furthermore, Hamburg is not totally alien to him after he competed there at the 2023 World Junior Championships. With that in mind, as much as debuts can very easily go wrong, Vannerson’s has a chance of going very right.
In a similar boat is Brayden Mercer. He will be making his Series bow after winning a silver medal at the Napier World Cup. Napier was also a sprint distance race and one at which Mercer showed he can throw down fast splits in the swim and run. For all the attention that is likely to be on Hauser, a younger version with a remarkably similar skill-set will be waiting in the wings.
Searching for a second hit
Of the eleven men with WTCS medals starting in Hamburg, six have one under their belt. They are Willian, Mislawchuk, Lührs, Lehmann, Serrat and Sanchez. Notwithstanding that even winning one medal in the Series is a major achievement beyond the majority of the best triathletes in the world, each would dearly love to get back onto the podium at least once more. Mislawchuk in particular has been in fine fettle this season while Lührs will likely get a boost from a home crowd. Sanchez has also looked dangerous on the run at his races this year. Any of them, though, could strike if everything clicks on the day.
Sneak attack
Hamburg is not a course with many surprises or twists. The short swim passage under the bridge (which is renowned for a bit of rough and tumble) aside, the course is fast, flat and not hugely technical. Close finishes are therefore the norm. Hauser’s 6 second margin of victory last year was actually the biggest in Hamburg since Mario Mola won in 2017 by 12 seconds.
Any athletes looking to separate themselves from the rest will therefore need to be tactically smart. To that end, Hayden Wilde’s 2023 victory is instructive where he launched a sneaky attack in the run-in to T2, buying precious seconds that carried him to the finish line. There are so many fast runners on the start list that speed alone will realistically not be the decisive factor. Rather, tactics and timing will make the difference.
Catch all the action in Hamburg live on TriathlonLive on 12th July and stay informed with all the latest developments across all World Triathlon channels. View the full men’s start lists here.
