by By Ben Hart
Flora Duffy is an Olympic gold medalist in triathlon, but ahead of her first T100 foray of the season, she says she feels like a “rookie” at the sport again.
Duffy, 36, was focused on defending her Tokyo gold medal in Paris, but a series of injuries almost forced her off the start line.
She battled back to finish fifth and is now focused on conquering the longer courses on the T100 circuit, starting with this weekend’s race in Ibiza.
“I feel like I’m a rookie to triathlon again, I’ve been racing for over 10 years and now I’m entering this new side of triathlon with new challenges and it kind of makes me uncomfortable “I’m comfortable and I’m not as confident that I’ll have so much to learn, but it’s a really exciting place to be,” Duffy said.
“I have no expectations of myself. I’ve won some really big short course events, so you always have a bit of a reputation, but it’s exciting to take part in something new, to take on a new challenge and improve with each race.
“There’s a really good field this weekend, probably one of the best the T100 has had all year and the T100 is taking place in a lot of cool locations around the world. It’s very tempting to take on this distance and event.
“The cool thing about triathlon is that you can go over distances as your career progresses and you can be very accomplished in one of these disciplines and you progress up to the T100 distance and that may or may not go well for you. It’s such a different racing dynamic.
The field for this Saturday’s race is impressive even by T100 standards, with Anne Haug, Taylor Knibb and Ashleigh Gentle – the top three PTO athletes in the world at the end of last year – lining up on the line. leaving for the first time together. .
Duffy cannot be ruled out though and she could be among those joining Paula Findlay in picking up the pace on the bike and taking a promising position in the run.
“It’s a nice sea swim so it’s going to be really nice, it’ll probably be my favorite part of the race.” The 80km by bike is the longest part of the triathlon, so it’s a fairly fast and rolling course, a little hilly, nothing too technical. The conditions aren’t too extreme either, which is good,” added Duffy.
“I can’t wait to run, for me it’s about reaching a new distance.
“They’re usually short course Olympic distance races, so it feels like a whole new side of triathlon, which is exciting and it’s a really good area, we’re in a cool place – racing in Ibiza is quite different from us and everyone else it is on the island.
“It should be a really, really exciting race and I can’t wait to see how it goes.”
Watch the Ibiza T100 Triathlon races live in Europe on Eurosport 2. The broadcast for the men takes place from 07:45 in the UK, with the race starting at 08:00, then the women dive at 10:30. The Ibiza T100 races and behind-the-scenes content can be watched live and free on from anywhere.
