Beth Potter went into October's 2025 Wollongong Championship Finals as the Series leader and knowing that a win would see her become only the second British woman ever to win multiple world titles.
She would leave the course in a wheelchair having effectively blacked out on the run, dragging herself over the line to finish high enough placed to secure an overall podium.
On the latest episode of the World Triathlon Podcast's 2025 season reviews, we hear exactly what happened in the lead in to that wild race, the three minutes that Beth knew she was in pole position for the title after Cass Beaugrand had dropped, and how the fire is now fuelled for a huge 2026.
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The story begins in Karlovy Vary. Going into the race fourth in the rankings, it was nearly two years since Potter's last gold, her title-winning Pontevedra race at the end of 2023.
“I'm still very hard to beat on my day, and I think by the time I got to Karlovy Vary I just didn't care anymore. I was like, ‘I'm just going for it. I'm gonna win this’.
But there was a minute to the leaders Maya Kingma and Taylor Spivey off a hard bike, and only 10km in the rain to reel them in.
“I didn't even think I'd left myself a lot of work there, I just knew that I was taking 10 seconds out every kilometre and I was just going to keep going. Maybe I had a different motivation that day as well… I just didn't want to have any regrets. It was a really emotional race for me… and I feel like that kicked on from how I knew training had been going. I just so wish I could have held onto that form for three more weeks, but it wasn't to be.”
The Series really kicked into gear from the end of August, with four races in 6 weeks to decide the titles. That quartet started in France, moved to Karlovy Vary, then hit Weihai ahead of the Wollongong Finals. Just the time to hit form, but fitness would again prove to be even more important. Heading to Weihai, things took a turn.
“I think I had less than about 12 days to turn it around including a long-haul travel and then trying to recover off the back of an Olympic distance on a hard course.”
She had rested, flown business, ‘done everything right’. But, on landing in Shanghai for her connecting flight, Potter suddenly felt a sharp pain in her heel and could barely walk off the aeroplane.
“I'd had no symptoms off the back of Karlovy Vary. I had this race on Friday, and I wanted to be in the best shape possible, and I had no idea where this foot pain had come from. I couldn't really put any weight through my heel.”
Through the week, the pain would ease, the race was on, and Potter blasted the swim and bike and left the field for dead quickly on the run. Problem solved? Not even close. With bbout 4.5km to go, she felt something ‘go’. Fortunately she had a big enough lead to be able to jog it in. “Then everyone's asking me after the race what's wrong? I was like, ‘oh, it's just a blister’, because I really didn't know what it was… and I just kept it on the down low as much as possible.”
Nothing was going to stop Potter taking that start line in Wollongong and a shot at a second title, but the drama was only just beginning. To hear the full story of what went down in Wollongong, listen to episode 112 of the World Triathlon Podcast.
