They finished the overall Series as two-and-three in 2025, and Brazil’s Miguel Hidalgo and Portugal’s Vasco Vilaça will be marked men as the season gets underway in Samarkand on Saturday 25 April.
The postponement of Abu Dhabi has shaken up the start of a year in which the first Olympic Qualification points will be fought for. The weekend will also see defending World Champion Matt Hauser start his year with a T100 debut against Hayden Wilde in Singapore, Alex Yee tackles the London Marathon, this time as a pacer.
Meanwhile, Vasco Vilaça heads a host of talent chasing a first WTCS gold in a start list that, unlike the women’s line up, has only seen three athletes take the tape at the top level – Hidalgo and Germans Henry Graf and Tim Hellwig.
It’s a 1500m lake swim with no Aussie exit, hard, flat and potentially windy 40km bike that runs the opposite direction to the past two years’ World Cups here, then a 10km run to glory. You can watch all the action on TriathlonLive from 12.45pm CEST on Saturday 25 April.
Brazil counting on hero Hidalgo
A career-first WTCS gold for Hidalgo was earned the hard way in Alghero last May, the Brazilian pulling clear of the field out of T2 after a hard 40km ride and then detonating a 10km run that nobody could match. That was to be his sole gold out of 4 podium appearances in 2025, while Vilaça’s four podiums consisted of 3 silvers and a bronze.
The head-to-head stats for 2025 swing 4:2 in Vilaça’s favour, but it can be argued that Hidalgo is more at home over the Olympic distance. His lightning quick 10km recorded in Spain last weekend served to underline that theory. Clocking a time of 28:22 will have turned plenty of heads, and anything close to that would surely leave the rest of the Samarkand field scratching theirs too.
How far back Hidalgo and Vilaça come out of the water and how hard they are made to work on the bike could be decisive. Henry Graf (GER) was the 2025 revelation who front-pack-swam then burned up two hard, Olympic-distance bike and run courses in Karlovy Vary and Weihai, earning his first Series gold in the former after splitting open the field with a mighty ride alongside Mark Devay (HUN) and Tjebbe Kaindl (AUT). Graf beat Hidalgo twice last year, but has never finished ahead of Vilaça.
Swim force to the fore?
Other upcoming names to watch over the first 1500m, likely no-wetsuit-swim, are Marton Kropko (HUN) and Alessio Crociani (ITA), who will also want to nullify the threat of David Cantero (ESP), Hugo Milner (GBR) and Gold Coast's 10km bullet John Reed (USA). Three of the fastest runners in the field, putting as much daylight as possible between the bike packs and working to open it up further over the 40km will surely be key.
Milner and Cantero may have established themselves as huge threats and clocked some of the fastest run times in recent years, but they have only one WTCS medal between them; Cantero’s sparkling Wollongong Finals silver. They will need to have both the collective bike power and will if they are to make up that ground with their fellow chasers.
Current U23 World Champion Oli Conway (GBR) has been hugely impressive in his handful of World Cup and WTCS starts, taking the tape in Haikou last month to prove his form and make him one to watch for what would be a remarkable podium in just his second WTCS outing. The ever-consistent Csongor Lehmann (HUN) and Charles Paquet (CAN) will also be hungry to pick up precious early-season points in the Series starter.
WTCS SAMARKAND
FULL MEN’S START LIST
25 APRIL FROM 15.45 local / 12.45 CEST
TRIATHLONLIVE.TV