Should rename this to Official 2021-2024 World Triathlon discussion thread (ITU is dead)... I expect that over the winter we'll see the Olympic qualification process documents come out from World Tri, and then the federations will follow with their selection policies, but generally qualification would start June/July 2022 (24month qualification process ahead of the games). Will be interesting to see what changes happen to this, after Tokyo, and see whether rules around relay selection change.

In terms of Knibb, her Edmonton race was impressive (equally so were her performances in Montreal, racing each of the super sprint races uber aggressively, and Flora riding her wheel to victory), but she's still missing a bit of consistency with her swim to be consistently in a place where her bike strength can be dominant. I'd also say that there were tactics at play in Edmonton which gave her a bit longer of a leash than she might have otherwise had (Flora was the big one with the strength to bridge to her or chase her down, but she didn't need to do that in order to win the title, so she just marked her rivals for the overall, and none of them were strong or motivated enough to chase down Knibb). It's still a super impressive performance, but I don't know that I'm ready to assume that she'll fully dominate the next olympic cycle. It'll also be interesting to see if Lucy Charles-Barclay gives Paris a serious run. We saw in Leeds how much her swim changed the game tactically, and could play a serious role in race dynamics when she's around, and potentially puts Knibb in a situation where her bike strength would be needed just to bridge to the break, rather than just to breakaway...

We don't have to wait long for the race to the 2022 World Triathlon Championships Series, since it kicks off in a couple of weeks in Hamburg (although it might be a diminished field, with many choosing to race for the dough on offer by Super League)...

Karlovy Vary World Cup today. Arguably the best course on the World Triathlon calendar. Looking forward to it on triathlonlive.tv

And then followed wit SuperLeague Munich. We’re spoiled today!

Great racing by the women in Munich!

“beverage…anyone?”

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Aaron Bales
Lansing Triathlon Team

what is ITU doing? shooting their foot? how is it possible that superleague Jersey and Hamburg world series are set in the same weekend? As far as I know ITU and SL has a deal right? not a good one for ITU, I guess. All the top guys are withdrawning Hamburg to go to Jersey...so as a start for the 2022 wts season...i cannot congratulate ITU....the Hamburg´s fields are even weaker than a world cup...hope they will solve it cause WTS will lose interest in the future... IMO, they are still there because of the olympics, otherwise the athletes get paid much better thanks to PTO, the french grand prix, german grand prix, US Tri Series, etc...
If Challenge or IM are smart snough, they can get a piece of the cake...

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Spaniard. Sorry for my english for the sensitive ones :P

I don’t think knibb is an inconsistent swimmer. She got boxed out in Tokyo, has she had any other problems? I am genuinely asking…

Changed the title. Hmmm. I think some IM people will be confused ( WTC = IM ) which is why I did not like the name change when they unveiled it…

The conflict of Jersey with Hamburg happened with the rescheduling of Hamburg due to travel restrictions/Olympic conflict. It sucks, because the fields are a bit more spread out, added to that it's also 70.3 Worlds weekend, and people are taking downtime after the Olympics. The fall of an olympic year is always a bit more wide-open with a lot of new names on start lists, as countries start to focus on the next quadrennial (triennial?).

Given that SuperLeague wanted to do a month, there was always going to be a conflict unless they did December, so at least it's only one WTCS weekend, and not a conflict with Bermuda.

Karlovy Vary was interesting racing, it's a great course, with tons of excitement. With the field being a mix of a couple of WTCS racers and then a lot of others who are seasoned World Cup competitors and some making the jump from the continental circuits, it meant for unpredictable racing.

Looking forward to Hamburg, and Jersey.

I think they made a mistake starting the season this year, athletes can never seem to be arsed after an Olympics anyway, add to that the obvious Superleague that's going on, I wonder if its too late for them to switch it to a world cup race?

They wouldn't switch, the host fees and requirements are very different for WC and WTCS, not to mention the points, prize money and everything else. Making a last minute demotion in status would likely have the few top athletes bail in protest.

It'll still be a great race, and they're back to the usual downtown course from the alternate venue they used last year, so it will still be exciting. I'd love to get back to that event one of these years, one of the craziest races to experience (17,000 age groupers, a T-zone nearly 1mile long), 100,000 spectators for the WTCS and relay races, and Erdinger Stands on every corner...

Lots of Tri to watch tomorrow, Superleague Jersey with the early starts, followed by Hamburg. I did notice that a few folks opted out of racing Superleague Jersey to race Hamburg, and then will rejoin for Malibu.

I think some NGBs wouldn’t release their athletes from the Hamburg race.

And unsurprisingly Germany was one of those NFs... I half wondered why they hadn't flipped the Munich and Jersey legs, so that people could have doubled up and maybe been around for the Mixed Relay. But Jersey was likely the first one that superleague had booked...

Its more than a mistake it's friggen ridiculous. 2022 season starts in 2021. I hope they have enough races in the actual 2022 so these races can be not needed series points by the athletes that can't race them. There are still travel restrictions in some countries with crazy flight prices. If athletes had purchased flights home prior to these races being announced, changing plans may not have been possible. 2020 was a no go year for some, 2021 not great for travelling and now they muck up 2022 season as well. That's 3 yrs in an athletes career that world championship series has been messy. I feel for those effected.

That Hamburg start list is terrible, they must be fuming with Superleague and Ironman, this was bound to happen at some point.

1.Bergere
2.Salvisburg
3.Stornes

1.Rapparport
2.Lindemann
3.Kasper

I'm pretty surprised there are enough athletes from both races to have 10 MTR teams.

All those top athletes had already signed their superleague contracts and had no option either.

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Super League has been partnered with World Triathlon (Then ITU) for three years ITU and Super League confirm partnership with signing of MOU — World Triathlon ..They went out of their way to schedule their pre 2020 Olympics SL Series specifically to work with the Olympic programs of the ITU Federations leading up to Tokyo..They now share the media platform TriathlonLIVE and both series are available and feed off each other..There is full disclosure between SL and World Triathlon so I am not sure about any animosity.
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Watch out for my guy, Darr Smith!

Doesn't bother me at all, got a lot more interest in Superleague at the moment than ITU in a post Olympic year.

Might worry the athletes if there aren't enough races in 2022 for this one to not be needed for the points.

Did Stornes race an ironman recently? If so I'll go Benson for 3rd instead.

Is that a possibility?

I would think they would just make it a larger number of races and stick with the usual 5 races plus the grand final. (I think it's 5+1, I could be wrong)

Do you know if he's going to shave his....DYED....mustache for the race?
Good kid. I'm a fan.

Would hope that is the case.

Now Bermuda cancelled....this is a joke. The best they can do is to cancel Abu Dahbi too and start the 2022 season properly. Hamburg was a mistake knowing that SL was going to be held...they cannot think they can put any date...so, who will be training for November? Nobody... As I said in my other post, they are spoiling the series...

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Spaniard. Sorry for my english for the sensitive ones :P

This^^^

Say what you want about the fields in Hamburg, but damn were those races entertaining. 7 men together with 400m to go, 4 man sprint to the line with a photo finish? Hellwig is no joke, he's been on form, winning his qualifier in the Montreal eliminator, and 2nd at U23 Worlds in Edmonton. Laura Linderman is perennially on the podium in Hamburg, so unsurprising for her to take the title...

And that MTR... While with pretty much everyone racing dev teams, everything was mixed up in terms of the top nations, that Italy Germany duel for the win was insane. Penalty in T1 on the last leg, and then a masterclass on the run in terms of building a gap and breaking the italian in the first 1400m, so that he could serve the 10s penalty and still hang on to the line.

While it was depleted fields, it was certainly memorable racing in all 3 races...

Nothing against the racing, it was entertaining to watch. With over 20 of both the top men's and women's athletes missing the opportunity to earn points this round due to the conflict of events, and it actually still being 2021, no events should count for 2022 series championship points. 2022 is 2022 not 2021. Both 2020 and 2021 have been crazy, mixed up years for many athletes. Let everyone reset for a refreshed 2022 when borders are expected to be open and more athletes can travel with less stresses and hassles.

There was always going to be at least one event (Bermuda) after the grand final counting towards 2022, COVID or no, just because of the Edmonton climate forcing the grand final a few weeks earlier to prevent it becoming a duathlon... That said, there should still be a full season next year (barring any crazy COVID related rescheduling) ahead of the Grand Final that will allow people to make up points for missing Hamburg and or/Abu Dhabi this year...

That said, the people who should be the most concerned aren't those at the top, it's more those in the middle, where some of their competitors have grabbed some top results with weaker fields, that will move them up the standings at year end... But we know racing will get serious in June/july next year when the OG qualifying cycle starts again...

Agree. It is the folks in the 10-30 range who are missing out if they didn't go to Hamburg and won't go to Abu Dhabi.

Have they posted the start dated for the 2024 qualifications? I wonder if they will postpone a few months, or keep it the same as usual.

Nothing posted yet, it usually goes up during the off-season, so I suspect February ish they will post the World Tri qualification process, so that the national federations have a few months to then post their selection criteria built around that, before qualification starts. In terms of when it will start, it's usually two years out from the race, so I am not sure what the dates are for Paris. If it's a July date, then I would expect sometime June or July for the qualification process to start, if it's August, it might be a smidge later. It's not really in world tri's best interest to push it back, because with Olympic qualification points available for races, there's more incentive for athletes to race more, and for top athletes to show up and to fight for points for their federations.

That's an interesting point. I never really thought that World Triathlon would push for more races counting as qualifiers. But if it incentivizes people to race, it makes perfect sense.

I'm anxiously waiting to see the remainder of the 2022 World Series calendar, and how that plays into the Olympic Qualification.

The last 2 olumpics qualification started in Yokohama mid may and both would have finished there as well if covid hadn't struck. Olympic points qualifying normally finishes a couple of months out to allow teams to finalise and athletes to focus.

First round of dates for WTCS/World Cups, Para, etc. for 2022 have been announced. Obviously these are not yet completed, and there may be additional events (especially world cup).

2022 World Triathlon Championship Series:
September 2021 - Hamburg, GER
November 2021 - Abu Dhabi, UAE
14-15-May Yokohama, JPN
11-12 Jun Leeds, GBR
25-26 Jun Montreal, CAN
9-10 Jul Hamburg, GER
22-23 Oct Chengdu, CHN
Abu Dhabi, UAE (Championship Series Final)
Mixed Relay:
11-12 Jun Leeds, UK
25-26 Jun Montreal, CAN – World Championships
9-10 Jul Hamburg, GER
World Triathlon Cup:
12-13 March - Miyazaki, JPN
30 April - 1 May - Haeundae KOR
7-8 May - Osaka, JPN
28-29 May Arzachena, ITA
18-19 Jun - Huatulco, MEX
27-28 Aug - Bergen, NOR
3-4 Sept - Valencia, ESP
10-11 Sept - Karlovy Vary, CZE
24-25 Sept - Weihai, CHN
1-2 Oct - Tongyeong, KOR
29-30 Oct - Miyazaki, JPN
Para Triathlon:
14-15-May Yokohama, JPN – World Triathlon Para Series
11-12 Jun Besancon, FRA – World Triathlon Para Cup
18-19 Jun - A Coruna, ESP – World Triathlon Para Cup
6-7 Aug Swansea, GBR World Triathlon Para Series
Abu Dhabi, UAE - World Championships
Winter Triathlon:
5-6 Feb Andorra, AND – Winter Triathlon World Championships

Thanks for posting.
That's nice to see so many races potentially on the calendar.

I'm curious how many Oly/Sprint/Super-sprint's we'll see. And if they change the point allocation based on race distance.

Looks like Bergen is the only new location. We'll get to see the Haeundae course in a week or so.

I would guess they are trying to find 2-3 more WTCS races to fill that 13 (!) week gap. Alternatively they could be trying to de-emphasize the series as the exclusive racing domain of the top athletes. Ie. Expect that more top names will race world cups and super league. Which could potentially have the effect of making the remaining WTCS races more competitive…but I doubt it. I bet they are just having trouble finding top level hosts even this far into Covid times.

This calendar is nonsense. No WTCSs in august and september and Abu Dhabi probably in november. I guess the reason is to leave those spare weeks for superleague.
IMO the best they could have done is to finish in august...I have never understood why they barely race in july and august in non olympic years. Besides, they might start in march as usual, or early april..
I am also curious about the format of each race. Hope they dont do eliminators cause Superleague is an expert on that and hope World Triathlon gets back to more full olympic distance instead of sprint (Hamburg, Montreal will be sprint though, and Chengdu, despite I hate it, will be an eliminator or semifinals+final)...
Given that KB will be focused in IM, my favourites are Wilde and Luis. Amongst the women, GTB and see wether Duffy races St.George and Kona both.

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Spaniard. Sorry for my english for the sensitive ones :P

They have to leave space for the Commonwealth games at the end of July.

Despite not all countries participating, Commonwealth Games is considered a Major games for World Tri, so they do leave some time around it. It's a bit tricky for 2022, given that they have races this year that roll over and increase the number of events. I suspect that they may add one more WTCS event, and likely a few more world cups to the Calendar to fill the schedule. Part of the reason for the Gap, is that Abu Dhabi is not really feasible venue in August because of the temperatures, which is why the Grand Final will likely be late (I don't think it'll be November though, likely Sept/October, the reason for the november date this year was that Bermuda was slated for October, and they wanted to spread out the dates after things were rescheduled due to COVID outbreaks). It's extremely unlikely that the gap in the Calendar is there to accommodate Superleague, it's more that working with the dates they could get for their WTCS venues, that's how it falls...

Well with chengdu WTCS race scheduled for 23rd Oct Abudhabi will be likely early November. A long season.

For sure, 14months if you work back to Hamburg... People will likely be more selective on races towards their overall scores, rather than just following the circuit for 14months...

Stupid, no need for Hamburg and Abudhabi this year to be included when May to sometime in Nov is already longer than the seasons from a few years back.

It's awkward for sure, but when C19 postponements knocked those event dates out past the Grand Final for 2021, it put them in an awkward spot, the events paid for WTCS status, but the series ends with the grand final, so what do you do? It just becomes weird that there will be two hamburgs and two abu dhabis in the points for 2022, along with the long-assed series. I'll be surprised if they don't hear from the athlete's commission about the length of the season and course correct in the coming years, with the grand final not pushing past the end of september...

The 2021 World Rugby 7s Series had two events after all the other events cancelled. Now think about that, lol.

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Washed up footy player turned Triathlete.

With many athletes living away from home to race the series stretching out past September makes it very hard. Accommodation expenses and visas would be some of the issues they face.

Agreed, in someways the circuit remains pretty euro-centric, in the sense that it's easier for the euro based racers, who can easily hop events, whereas those from the americas, asia, africa or oceania have to base themselves in europe for large chunks of the season, or face more expensive and draining travel for the individual events. One thing done kind of well this year, was clumping the euro events, the canadian events, etc. together so that people could spend a few months in europe, and month in Canada, etc.

Second Korean leg of the World cup is this weekend in Tongyeong, Heundae last weekend was pretty exciting racing, and a masterclass from Beth Potter, will be interested to see how this weekend's sprint races shape up.The swim conditions (waves and surf) will likely be less of an impact this weekend compared to last weekend.

My predictions for Abu Dahbi

Women
Duffy
Taylor Brown
Lindemann

Lucy Charles is racing!!!!!!!! I predict a top 15...transitions will punish her


Men
Luis
Wilde
Serrat

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Spaniard. Sorry for my english for the sensitive ones :P

Hard to look past Duffy. Not sure how much training GTB has done this past month. She was in top form the other weekend in a XC race for her club.

I think there will be a breakaway of about 5. Learmonth, LCB, Duffy, possibly Rapperpor and possibly GTB. How much they can work together and stay away is hard to tell so late in the season.

Some NGBs will have their athletes focusing on this race and some won’t. Spivey and Kramer are my outsider choices.

It is only a sprint distance so Potter might be able to run through to top 5 if the lead group get caught.

EDIT: just realised Knibb is racing. Bit of a game changer with break away group.

Men hard to look past Luis as Yee isn’t racing.

I'd be surprised if LCB isn't top 10, I don't think she'll threaten the podium with it being a sprint distance, and a less challenging course (terrain wise, and relatively challenging technically).

Generally those are some good picks, I wouldn't count out Geens and Mislawchuk (who has a pretty stellar record on hot AF conditions) either, and Vilaca and Bergere are also podium threats.

Beth Potter is on fire lately, dominating the two Korean world cups, and yes these fields are deeper, but she's got some momentum. That said, the LCB effect on the swim, may make her path to the podium much harder, it's also why I am less convinced that Laura Lindemann can crack the podium. I would swap in Learmonth as a podium threat, because she can be there with LCB on the swim, and coldwell and rappaport as dark horses, the bike might be too technical for summer, but she could be there or thereabouts after the swim and if she doesn't get dropped on the bike will be a threat...

I agree, as long as LCB stays upright, I don't see her out of the top 10. Her only weakness is transition, tactics, and bike handling. Hard to be out of the top 10 if you're top 10 in each discipline.
At least two people crashed on the F1 track in the last day.
I suspect we'll see a few crashes that change how the race plays out.

Women's race is VERY deep. We will see multiple podium threats out of the top 10/15.
I really doubt anyone who is a weaker cyclist will have a good race. Too hot and fast for that.

Should be fun!

Heck yes it is. If she's anywhere near the front of the swim I expect her to literally blow past those in front of her with complete wreckless abandon. Only those able to latch on to her wheel and go with her will have a chance at the podium.

YMMV,

Hugh

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Genetics load the gun, lifestyle pulls the trigger.

Good come back win from Jelle! Vincent also getting back to near top run fitness is good to see.

She almost dropped everyone a twice!
But not quite. Held on for 5th. Impressive on a HOT day.

Those front 5 are so impressive. I've never seen anything like it.

Yes well done today. Taylor did an impressive catch up after a bit of a swim deficit and then did the lion's share of the drilling it on the bike to build the group a very nice lead into the run. The other front gals certainly took full advantage of her hard work. She really adds to the dynamic of the women's race. Weaker bikers will definitely moan when they see her on a start list.

Hugh

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Genetics load the gun, lifestyle pulls the trigger.

12th for LCB, which doesn't sound horrible, but she was the 7th Brit!! That team is crazy stacked. She'll need to improve both her bike and run to have a shot at Paris in 2024. Transition times are on par with others, which is a good thing.

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Blog: http://262toboylstonstreet.blogspot.com/
https://twitter.com/NateThomasTri
Coaching: https://bybtricoaching.com/ - accepting athletes for 2023

Her run was decent but her bike handling was horrible. She clearly has the power to make the front group but not the skills at the moment. She rode 4 of the 5 bike laps solo which shows that she can ride hard. But she lost 10 meters every corner in the first lap on the front group which you can't keep making up. I'm impressed by how she managed to hang on the run. Let's hope she does some cross races or crits the next few months.

I agree that her skills could use some improvement.
Watching the race, it looked like she was lacking a top end to hold/close a gap as well.
GTB almost fell off the back a few times. And that was all from lack of speed/power. I imagine GTB and LCB are about the same strength on the bike at the moment, but GTB has a slightly higher top end.
Obviously LCB can TT with the best of them, so I'm not surprised she held off the chase group on the bike.

I'm wondering if going hard out of the swim is a foreign concept for her. She's not used to being in a swarm of women as fast/faster than her.

I kept double checking during the women's race that I wasn't watching the GB National champs being crashed by Flora and Knibb... 12th is a solid result for LCB, Despite being a race track, Abu Dhabi has always been one of the tougher technical courses, which will exposed weaknesses in that area, which we know is her weakness... Flora's injury cycle that almost derailed her Olympic aspirations started with a crash on that track, Jo Brown (also a strong bike handler) has sustained broken bones on that course twice, Katie Z has wrecked there among many others... Lucy's TT class actually worked against her in this case, she couldn't close down to the front, but was strong enough to hold off the chase, but in the meantime expended a lot of energy that she wouldn't have had she let the chase catch, which likely hurt her on the run. I love watching courageous racing, and she crushed that, but it likely cost her a few spots due to the lack of run legs.

Knibb is a beast on the bike, and she showed that class, but there was a solid lead group and she couldn't quite shed them, which meant that her bridging efforts likely took some pop out of her run legs... The women's racing is exciting right now, because you can't really have a weak discipline to have much of a chance these days. Because that front pack are solid across the 3 legs, as long as they work together off the swim, there's not really much of a chance to get back in and challenge the podium. I suspect between here and Yokohama in May, a lot of ladies are going to be hitting the swim and bike hard to try and reduce their deficits to the floras/lcb/learmonths, etc. of the world in hopes to catch the Knibb train...

Lucy's TT class actually worked against her in this case, she couldn't close down to the front, //

How is she supposed to close down to a group that she couldn't even draft off of? Lucy's gift and albatross is that she will always be at the front of the race, have every chance in the world to just stay there, and can only go backwards in most cases. Her next pitch up should show a good sized raspberry on her hip if she wants to hang with the group she swims with...

6-12th place pretty close finish and yea team GBR is stacked monster..... perhaps the athletes should do like some kenyans and get exported run for other countries ha ha. So awesome that Lucy can compete top level from sprint to 140.6 yet all these threads about sanders and iden

To be fair, Iden is also performing across all of the distances similarly to Lucy.

And yes, generally there are very few people in the fields that can bridge solo to a lead group (Knibb and Spirig being two of them). LCB's case was a little interesting in that she really got dropped not because of engine, but because of technique, the gap opened up in a technical section, where her cornering put her out the back. You can sometimes leverage a straighter section to bridge that gap, but if you start going backwards, after a lap, that's where you have to think about sitting up and waiting for the next group, rather than frying yourself sitting in between for 15km... These lessons will come with experience, and she'll get there with a fuller season of WTCS racing...

Helen Jenkins made that point - she had the power not the technique - in the broadcast near the end of the first lap. I dont think so. I think she doesn't have the needed 3-5 second power. The string snaps at 17:48 race time going up a hill (take a look). And she was losing time coming out of the turns(when they press the accelerator) not due to her turn angles.

For the first time I can remember an absolute stacked women's field and a prety average men's field.

(What's happening with Mola and Gomez?)

Wilde needs to sort his run out, he seems to surge too early, burn himself out and go backwards, did it a couple of times in Superleague.

Absolutely fascinating women's field, think we was only missing Zaferes and Spirig.

Quite surprised not to see LCB lead out the swim, I wonder if that was tactical from her or she just found it too fast?

Business as usual though from GTB, Duffy and Learmonth front pack group with the lead they put into everyone (with the added firepower of Knibb)

Got very annoyed with the shoddy camera work, they was on a track, how hard was it? We missed the crucial part of the race after GTB caught Duffy we missed Duffy drop GTB, we missed Coldwell drop Learmonth and we seen nothing of the battle between Potter/Stanford/Beaugrand/Holland etc lots of helicopter shots though!

Brit females are absolutely stacked at the moment 6 in a top 10 can't have been done before?

Did you hear about Wilde's pre race build up? Not surprised he faded a bit

I'm not sure we're right, but I agree with you.
I thought it looked like she couldn't make the bike go super fast. Obviously she has as good of a diesel engine as anyone else in the field. But I doubt she could 20k TT with Knibb, Flora, or Jess.

Women's race was missing Katie (possibly out of DL) and Spirig (pretty sure she's done DL).
Kingma, Periault, and Kasper are the only top guns who will be racing next year, that didn't make the start.
It was pretty cool just how competitive it was on the women's side.
Just look at how chaotic the chase was in the first few laps. Lots of shifting around and nothing was defined.

I've been told it was so mixed up in the chase that no one really knew what place they where in. Not a lot of out-and-backs.

I wonder if 6 out of 10 has been done before. Maybe by australia? Did the US women ever do that when they had three on the podium?

Not heard anything about his build up? As I said though he has this habit of going off the front, surging, fading and going backwards.

Maybe less surging and a different approach.

We had a short period of Gwen, True and Zafares being prety much the top 3 women but I don't remember them having another 3 in the top 10 at the time.

I thought Learmonth and Holland were both calling it a day after the Olympics but I'm guessing they're both sticking around for Commonwealth games at least?

Is it three slots each for Commonwealth? How is the selection working if it was based on last race?

Basically got detained in immigration twice on both flights and arrived a hour or so before the race start. Then got stung by a jellyfish. He does put in some crazy surges in at times and can be a bit too much Go Hard or Go Home. But then again that approach got him an Olympic medal.

The Australians definitely have had 6 in the top 10 but we might be going back to pre WTS when world Cup was essentially the WTS.

Not sure about selection for Commys as each home nation will be different. I actually can't see LCB making the England team as its GTB, Learmouth and Coldwell/Holland. Stanford and Potter for Wales and Scotland.

Commonwealths

England - GTB, Coldwell and Learmonth
Wales - Stanford and Mathias?
Scotland - Potter and ?

I think Katie Waugh is Scottish but not sure.

Waugh may have a Scottish granny but not to my knowledge.

Sophia Green is a solid, improving U23 that is probably good enough for B'Ham although haven't studied the selection criteria.

Is this the selected team? I'm quite surprised Holland is still racing then, prety sure she said she was calling it a day after Tokyo, unless now not being selected means she will retire.

a little humility is always good when speculating what a professional could do to perform better, especially one as good as LCB. But I went back and watched Leeds and saw the same thing. There was some interactions with Spivey in particular where you could feel that one athlete was simply stronger than the other over the short bursts.

Lucy also directly commented after Super League Malibu that she struggled with the top-end power on the bike, where she also got dropped from the front pack every time.

I don't think selections have been made yet, although Sophie Coldwell posted on IG after Abu Dhabi that she had fulfilled the auto-qualification criteria for the Commonwealth Games.

I hadn't seen that. She just mentioned it in her latest video about Abu Dhabi as well. Looks like she really is struggling with top end speed to close gaps.
She made a good point, starts might be hard to come by in the next year.
She's the 11th ranked GB women. And the three girls in front of her are all 5-6 years younger. Hard to give a WTS start to a 29 year old who isn't a top class runner compared to a 23 year old who is improving by the month. (ex: Kate Waugh)

For the sake of the sport, I think it's good to have her at races. Shows Long course folks just how competitive these races are.