Although there were moments in which it did not look like it was going to happen, Cassandre Beaugrand (FRA) made it three WTCS victories in a row in Sardinia with an overwhelming final push on the run. An uncharacteristic swim that left her 32 seconds behind the early pacesetter, Tilly Anema (GBR), was an ominous start. The Olympic champion nonetheless fought her way back to put herself in a four-way fight for gold at the finish. And when she launched her final move, the three WTCS gold medallists standing in her path had no answer.
Beaugrand was not the only one to be caught out early on. Anema’s time of 19:13 for the 1500m sea swim threatened to blow the race apart. Only WTCS race winner Sophie Evans (GBR), world champion Lisa Tertsch (GER) and World U23 Championships medallist Márta Kropkó (HUN) were able to contend with Anema, creating a pack of four that dictated the early terms of the race.
Fresh off a maiden T100 maiden, Taylor Spivey (USA) was in the chase group and had compatriot Taylor Knibb for company. Leonie Periault (FRA) likewise had a great swim to emerge in the same group, significantly in the pack ahead of Beaugrand and the woman that beat her to gold at WTCS Samarkand, Beth Potter (GBR).
The front quartet’s time alone at the front proved short-lived, however. Multiple huge turns across the array of small groups saw an eventual lead pack of 22 athletes come together. With so much power at the front, the group fissioned like a nuclear reactor, spitting out athletes from the back like discarded neutrons. Anema was one such athlete to lose contact, as was Bianca Seregni (ITA) who won a maiden WTCS medal on the same course a year prior.
The lead group gradually settled and arrived in T2 without further significant change. It was then, though, that Beaugrand came under pressure once more as she lost ground in transition. WTCS medallist Rosa Maria Tapia Vidal (MEX) led out onto the run with Potter in close pursuit. Leaving 13 seconds back was Beaugrand.
Over the course of the first half of the run, an elite group of five distanced themselves from the rest. Here, Tertsch, Potter and Beaugrand were joined by Jeanne Lehair (LUX) and Georgia Taylor-Brown (GBR). Taylor-Brown was the only woman other than Beaugrand to have won at Sardinian WTCS race while Lehair was in strong form having recently claimed consecutive WTCS bronze medals.
It was Taylor-Brown that cracked first as the pace told, her exertions from claiming a maiden T100 win last weekend likely coming into play. Entering the last lap, it was anyone’s guess as to who would win. Yet having worked so hard to haul herself back into contention, Beaugrand was not going to let the gold slip. Indeed, it was only earlier this week that she broke the French 5000m record on the track and that blistering speed duly shone through as she sprinted away to the win.
In a reversal of their finishing order behind Beaugrand in Sardinia in 2024, Potter then out-kicked Tertsch to take the silver, her second in a row after placing 2nd in Yokohama. In doing so, Potter became the first woman ever to medal at both events in the Yokohama-Sardinia May double. Tertsch, meanwhile, held on for a first WTCS medal of the year ahead of Lehair, and Periault came past Taylor-Brown to round out the top-5.
Athlete reactions to follow.