Four races into the 2025 women’s World Triathlon Championship Series and we are still waiting for a repeat winner. After Leonie Periault stunned Cassandre Beaugrand on the streets of Hamburg in the last round, this rollercoaster of a season is showing little sign of settling as it heads to the new destination of WTCS French Riviera.
A tantalising race beckons. All four 2025 winners are set to start on the French coast and all bar two of this year’s Series medallists will fly in to race. Throw in the multiple medallists from previous seasons and even making the top-10 will take a huge performance. Find out all the names to watch below.
Who’s there?
The natural place to start is with the French team. After all, they possess home advantage in addition to having won the previous two rounds of the Series. WTCS Hamburg winner Periault will clash again with WTCS Alghero winner Beaugrand. Hamburg was over the sprint distance, as WTCS French Riviera is, but Alghero was also a new course. The race will therefore pit the recent 5km savvy of Periault against Beaugrand’s ability to solve the challenges thrown up by new courses. Then, just to make the home team that bit more daunting, multiple WTCS medallist Emma Lombardi will also start.
Notably, the last international race to take place on French soil – the World Indoor Cup in Lievin – ended with a Beaugrand victory. However, silver and bronze that day went to German athletes. With that in mind, Team Germany will send a typically large squad to the French Riviera with the hope of plundering further medals.
WTCS Abu Dhabi winner Lisa Tertsch is the most obvious threat to the French team and enters on the back of winning the German title at the weekend. Her fellow Series (and German Champs) medallists Nina Eim and Annika Koch can also rarely be counted out over the sprint distance. Tanja Neubert has enjoyed a breakout 12 months, as has Franka Rust, and both are set to race, as is Julia Bröcker.
Meanwhile, Jeanne Lehair, the winner of WTCS Yokohama, now has Luxembourgish company on the start list with the return of Eva Daniels. Outside of Yokohama, Lehair has finished 7th at each of her three other Series appearances. She will eye a return to the podium on the French Riviera to propel herself onto the overall Series podium.
Beth Potter, the 2023 world champion, is part of a select club of women with two Series medals this year. She holds the overall leadership of the Series by a slender margin over Periault and a third medal would consolidate her position further. At the same time, Potter last won a WTCS race back in 2023 (in Pontevedra) and will gun for a return to the top step after some close calls this year. Olivia Mathias, a fellow Series medallist this year, joins Potter on the start list, as do Jess Fullagar and Sian Rainsley.
For the American team, an experienced trio of Summer Rappaport, Taylor Spivey and Erica Ackerlund will be racing. Team Australia, fresh off their triumph at the World Mixed Team Relay Championships, will also have three women starting through Emma Jeffcoat, Jaz Hedgeland and Sophie Linn. Furthermore, Canada will be sending three female athletes to the French Riviera: they are Emy Legault, Desirae Ridenour and Sophie Howell.
Tilda Månsson (SWE), Maya Kingma (NED) and Rosa Maria Tapia Vidal (MEX) are among the group of athletes to enter as the sole female athletes for their respective countries. All three have earned high finishes this year, with Kingma and Tapia also standing as previous Series medallists.
Who’s not there?
Laura Lindemann and Bianca Seregni are the only 2025 medallists missing from the women’s start list while Jolien Vermeylen is another to opt out after an outstanding July. From the Series top-20, Diana Isakova, Djenyfer Arnold, Kate Waugh and Gwen Jorgensen are the other absent names.
Four talking points
A dark horse
It is understandable that Olympic medallist Potter and recent maiden WTCS medallist Mathias would be the British names on the lips of most. Yet the British athlete to watch may actually be Jess Fullagar. Fullagar won last year’s French Grand Prix stop in Fréjus and so has a recent record of success in the area. It can be expected that WTCS French Riviera will resemble the Fréjus course in some respects which elevates Fullagar’s chances.
Breakaways have been the World Cup medallist’s calling card and she has featured in multiple this season. Her efforts at the Samarkand and Tiszaujvaros World Cups did not result in further medals, but they highlighted the danger she can pose. After Mathias used a similar tactic to claim a first medal in Alghero, it could be a smart bet to back Fullagar to do the same this month.
Bringing firepower
On the note of the Alghero breakaway, Maya Kingma played a massive role in the group’s success. The WTCS gold medallist has proven herself in all facets of triathlon over the years but lately it has been her cycling that has truly fired.
Kingma has been signed to race professionally as a cyclist and even made her debut at the women’s Giro d’Italia earlier this year. Unfortunately, her race was thwarted by a crash and she had to drop out. For the rest of the WTCS field, that could mean she has some lingering frustration and a point to prove, both of which can only be ominous. Indeed, if Kingma is in the groove, you won’t need many fingers to count the lead group as they arrive in T2.
Building a legacy
One of the top qualification stories of the Olympics last summer was Manami Iijima earning the Oceania New Flag slot for the women’s race. In doing so, she became the first woman to claim the New Flag from the region as well as becoming Guam’s first Olympian in the sport. This year, she is extending that legacy.
Last month, she helped Guam to a first ever relay medal at the Pacific Mini Games, overcoming illness that kept her out of the individual event the day prior. Now she is back on the WTCS circuit to mix it with the best in the world once more and inspire athletes from the smaller nations of Oceania and beyond that they too can make it to the top.
Still burning bright
Following an absence of four years, Barbara Riveros of Chile will be making her return to the WTCS this month. Riveros last competed at WTCS Leeds in 2021 before taking a few years out after the Tokyo Olympics. She enters WTCS French Riviera as the oldest athlete starting but arrives with some encouraging recent results. A top-10 finish at the recent Saidia World Cup came on the back of a bronze medal at the Pontevedra World Cross Triathlon Championships.
The last of Riveros’ numerous WTCS medals came in 2012. Yet she has done everything in the sport, from winning long distance medals to making cross triathlon podiums and to finishing 5th at the Rio 2016 Olympic Games. She was also the sprint distance world champion in 2011 and as such knows a thing or two about competing over the shorter format. With a wealth of experience to call upon, she could teach some of the younger stars a thing or two on the French coast.
There are a little over three weeks to go until WTCS French Riviera and all the latest information can be found across World Triathlon channels. The start lists can be found here and the racing will be shown live on TriathlonLive on 31st August.
