The Ironman 70.3 World Championship is in Nice this weekend, with about 6,500 amateur triathletes and 150 professionals entered over two days. Women race Saturday on a 1.9km swim, a 90km bike into the Maritime Alps and a 21.1km run along the Promenade des Anglais. Men use the same course Sunday. The World Triathlon Grand Finals follow on the final weekend of September, and the Ironman World Championship is in October.
Last year Lucy Charles-Barclay won the women's race, while Jelle Geens held off Norway's Kristian Blummenfelt to defend the men's title. Geens is back, but Charles-Barclay is not on the women's start list.
Among the women, Taylor Knibb is the only previous 70.3 world champion entered. She has won the title three times and will head from Nice to the cycling world championships in Canada before Kona. Solveig Lovseth, the reigning Ironman world champion, won Ironman Texas and Ironman Hamburg this year, with both times 8hr 11min.
British women include Kat Matthews, the reigning Ironman Pro Series champion and twice the 70.3 Worlds runner-up. She finished second to Laura Philipp in the 2024 Ironman World Championship in Nice, but pulled out on the run at last year's 70.3 Worlds in Marbella with a calf injury. A bike mechanical led to a DNF at Ironman Texas this year, and she finished fourth at Challenge Roth.
Philipp arrives after wins at Ironman Sweden and Ironman 70.3 Zell am See in August. Julie Derron, an Olympic silver medallist in 2024, placed fifth at the 2024 70.3 Worlds in New Zealand. Other British women entered are Lizzie Rayner, Rebecca Anderbury, Kate Curran and Sophie Evans. Rayner finished eighth last year.
In the men's race, Geens has won the past two titles in Taupo, New Zealand, and southern Spain last autumn. Lasse Nygaard Priester beat him at an Ironman 70.3 in Austria two weeks ago. Blummenfelt, Gustav Iden and Casper Stornes are among the Norwegians entered. Blummenfelt was second and Stornes third in Marbella last year, and Stornes is the reigning Ironman world champion.
Hayden Wilde of New Zealand, a two-time individual Olympic medallist, missed last year's race while winning the T100 series title, taking six of seven 100km races he entered. Marten Van Riel has the fastest 70.3 time in history and has never lost a 70.3 race. He won the 2024 T100 world title and won on the Nice 70.3 course in June last year.
Other men on the start list include Rico Bogen, the 2023 70.3 world champion, Morgan Pearson, multiple short-course world champion Vincent Luis and South Africa's Jamie Riddle. Britain's men are Sam Dickinson and James Teagle.
Source: 220triathlon.com