- Good morning trainiacs.
The Olympics is here.
Every four, sometimes five years, the Olympics comes around
and it's one of the biggest things all around the world
and people from all around the world
are introduced to triathlon.
This is a fantastic thing.
Something that's different this year
as opposed to previous years,
is that there is betting that can happen online.
I've never seen that before.
Now, some of the bookies out there
are completely off their rocker, in my opinion,
with who they feel that the favorites are,
but at least it gives us a reason to do this video.
So what we're gonna go through today
is the men's and the women's race, not the mixed relay
'cause I just don't know that much about it.
In the Olympics for triathlons coming up this weekend,
on Sunday you can watch the men's race
and then a couple days later you can watch the women's race
and with the info we're going to give you here,
you might have a little bit more me armor
when you're talking amongst your friends with who might win
and who could come out of nowhere
and really surprise people.
So let's start off with the men race.
This is pinnacle.com and you can go
and take a look at this for yourself
and who they have as the individual favorites
for the men are Mario Mola, Jonathan Brownlee,
Vincent Luis, Kristian Blummenfelt and Jacob Birtwhistle.
Now, let's start going through this point for point.
Mario Mola I would actually agree with here.
If we look at the current world triathlon ranking standings,
Mario Mola is ranked number one.
Now, in addition to that,
when you look at Mario Mola's actual physical capabilities
which I think is gonna make a really big difference here,
I think he's suited really well to do well in the Olympics
because it's going to be a very hot weather race
and the way the course is designed,
it favors a person that's fairly light
and obviously it being ITU draft legal,
it comes down a lot to the run.
Mario Mola, phenomenal runner, very light.
He is ranked number one in the world,
but what I would wonder here
is there have been races that have shown
that he isn't the Mario Mola of several years ago.
Time's like back here in 2018
where we had a lot of first, first, first, first,
second, fourth, third for a couple of years.
Well, now what we're seeing is third, 10th, 46, fourth,
there was a little bit of chinks in the armor.
So do I think that he is probably the favorite?
Maybe, I'll get to who I think is the favorite,
but I think he is definitely a podium contender.
Pinnacle then ranks Johnny Brownlee here
as the second favorite
and when we look at the current world standings
which I'll put a big asterisk on
because these are standings as of right now
and there hasn't been a ton of racing
over the past 18 months,
so the standings are really going to reflect
who has been able to race a lot,
not necessarily who is in top form.
Now, Johnny Brownlee is ranked fifth,
but when we look at his placings
over the past couple of years,
we're seeing the Johnny Brownlee of the last Olympics
where he was definitely one of the favorites
and we haven't really seen a ton of consistency from him
since way back in 2016 when he was coming into Rio.
That's when he was getting all over the podium,
seconds, first, second, seconds, four,
but looking at the last year or so, we've got a ninth.
We do have a first,
but that isn't a really top caliber kind of race
with as many competitors out there
as there are in some of the WTS events
and the two WTS events that he did before then
were 23rd place in 31st place.
So I don't think I would say that Johnny Brownlee
is going to be a medal contender.
Now, the third ranked athlete
that they have here on Pinnacle is Vincent Luis
and I would actually probably say
looking at Vincent's physical structure,
he's a smaller guy, he's a really good runner
and we like look at his recent placings,
first, first, first, first, first, first,
we also see that he did really well in Challenge Daytona.
In spite of penalty,
he would have been right there at the end
and this is somebody because of his physical makeup
and him being a younger athlete,
so this past year has really just been more time to develop
as opposed to more time like in say Mario Mola
and Jonathan Brownlee's case to just get a little bit older.
Vincent Luis is coming into his prime.
So honestly, I would say that Vincent Luis
is probably the or definitely one
of the gold medal contenders.
Now, next time list,
we've got Kristian Blummenfelt and Jacob Birtwhistle
and I'm just gonna go out on a limb here
and say, yeah, Kristian Blummenfelt, great talented athlete.
He's ranked second in the world currently
for the ITU standings, but because he's such a big athlete,
he's very muscular, he's very broad,
I think that that is not going to serve him
very well in the Olympics.
I'm not going to really even pick him to be on the podium
because I just think that physical makeup
combined with the heat, combined with the hills,
it's gonna be a little bit tougher.
And Jacob Birtwhistle being down here at 12th,
yeah, he's a great athlete,
but I wouldn't pick him to be the best of the best
here in triathlon.
Prove me wrong, Jacob.
I would be thrilled to see you do well
'cause you're pretty good follow on social media.
But two athletes who I think are going to do really well
are first, Tyler Mislawchuk.
Of course, I am very biased
because Tyler grew up like 15 minutes that way.
He has swam in the swim spa.
We went for runs when he was in town last year,
but something that Tyler said to me while we were running
when I said "Like, honestly,
"how do you think you can do in the Olympics?"
And he said, "I can't picture a course
"that is better suited for me.
"I'm light, so the hills help.
"I love racing in the heat, I'm light,
"so I am very good in the heat."
He also won the Tokyo test event
and then looking at what he's done
over the past couple of years,
like we're not seeing too many real explosions
and dominant performances in WTS race.
We're seeing a very nice upward trend
and he hasn't raced a ton in the past year.
So I think this past year
has been a lot of chance to really get stronger
because he's a young athlete coming into a lot of speed.
His most previous two events,
he was first, first, 51st with a flat tire,
second last year, fourth year before,
first in the Tokyo test event,
like this is an athlete
who is really well-designed for the course,
really well designed for the heat
and is coming into a lot of strength.
I will go out on a limb and say that I think Tyler
is one of the gold medal favorites.
In addition to I'm going out in left field here,
I'm going off the board, nobody is expecting this,
but I think that he has a really good chance, Alex Yee.
Now, why I think Alex Yee could do really well
is because he is such a small, slender athlete.
He's a phenomenal runner and because he's so small,
that's gonna serve him really well in the heat.
We also see that here in the Leeds event,
he ended up winning this event by 15, 25 seconds
against a pretty decent field
with Kristian Blummenfelt in here, Johnny Brownlee in here,
Fernando Alarza, like really strong athletes
that he went up against
and I think that he is showing
that he is one of the best athletes there
combined with the fact that his physical makeup
is probably going to suit him quite well.
I think he could definitely squeak his way on the podium
and being such a fast runner,
I wouldn't be surprised if he ran his way
through a big chunk of the field
and I'll mark him as my dark horse.
(horse neighs)
Onto the women's race
which I think is just an absolute crapshoot.
There's probably five, maybe even seven athletes
that could win gold even get on the podium.
This is a lot harder to test.
Now, we're gonna kind of do them all in one here
and the reason for that
is because I think they're so similarly matched.
Katie Zaferes, Georgia Taylor-Brown, Jessica Learmonth,
Vicky Holland, Taylor Spivey, Summer Rappaport.
They're all rated as the favorites on this pinnacle.com
and we look then at the world rankings currently,
Taylor Spivey, Summer Rappaport, Katie Zaferes,
Jessica Learmonth, Georgia Taylor-Brown,
Vicky Holland, Taylor Knibb, they're all up there.
So how do we determine really who I think
is going to be the best coming into the Olympics?
I think we have to start looking at recent placings.
And when we look at recent placings,
I think that these standings here that Pinnacle has laid out
might be a little bit tough.
So looking first at the historical favorite,
had you asked me this 18 months ago who is a favor?
I would have said hands down Katie Zaferes,
but her placing since last year
were 11th, sixth, 22nd, 18th.
This isn't boating super well for Katie Zaferes.
Other athletes who have done well recently, Taylor Spivey.
We can go to Summer Rappaport
who has gone ninth, second, 16th.
In 2019, third, fifth, third, very, very talented athlete.
Georgia Taylor-Brown, second, third, first, second, third.
Jessica Learmonth, second, fourth,
third, seventh, second, second.
Vicky Holland, fifth, first, seventh
and she has been on the podium at the Olympics
and we can't really even go to the Tokyo test event
to see who's gonna be a favorite
because it's kind of all over the board.
It's the same athletes, Katie Zaferes, Jessica Learmonth,
Georgia Taylor-Brown, Taylor Spivey, Vicky Holland.
And what we're seeing is that these athletes
are kind of just trading top five places over and over,
but what we're not seeing from any of these athletes
is like absolute dominance,
just consistently being on the podium
race after race, after race.
The two closest athletes that would be there,
I think would be Jessica Learmonth and Georgia Taylor-Brown
who have been kind of the top one and two in my opinion.
So I think the way to look at this
would actually be to see who is peaking right now,
who is coming into this with good form
and if we look at the last two major competitive races,
what we see is a little bit of a standout
and somebody who's on their way up.
Looking two WTS events ago in Yokohama,
we see yeah, Taylor Knibb, Summer Rappaport,
but third, Maya Kingma.
We had Maya on our podcast, it was a great podcast,
where she gave guidance
for how to use your mental preparation
as an advantage come race day
and after that, she came into Leads
and ended up winning against many of these great athletes,
Jessica Learmonth, Sophie Coldwell,
Flora Duffy, really good athlete,
Lucy Charles-Barkley, Taylor Spivey,
Beth Potter who set the 5k road race world record.
So Maya is coming into really, really good form.
Now, I can't really go and pick a gold medal favorite
because I think they're all so equally matched
and it really just comes down
to who gets some of the timing right,
with the tactics on the day
and who comes into the day feeling freshest.
But if I'm gonna pick the podium,
I'm thinking that Maya Kingma has a good shot.
I'm thinking that Jessica Learmonth also really good shot,
but I would say that the favorite
is probably gonna be Georgia Taylor-Brown.
What we haven't really seen from Georgia Taylor-Brown
is that she gets up to winning events,
but she isn't consistently dominant over and over and over.
So while I do think that she is likely the favorite
coming into it, could go any way
and it really might just come down
to who has the biggest kick in the last few kilometers.
So good luck to all the athletes who are there,
the ones that I mentioned, the ones that I didn't mention.
If you wanna go check out
GTN's take on how the races will unfold,
you can check out their video there
and if you wanna make sure
that you don't come across as a total tool
while you're watching triathlon
and the Olympics as a whole over the next few weeks,
there is a link in the description below
to an article that I did with Triathlete Magazine
that I thought was pretty funny, your boy's witty!
And if you aren't already subscribed,
hit the subscribe button below, later trainiacs.