Which aquabike races had the most finishers in 2021? The biggest one is not really surprise. With 147 finishers the Aquabike World Championships in Almere was the biggest aquabike race in 2021. But it might be a surprise that the European Championships in Walchsee didn´t even make it on the podium in this classification. Although the main reason for that are probably the travel restrictions for UK athletes, who were not allowed to come to Austria in June. But nevertheless it´s good to see that there are also some other races with a significant number of aquabike athletes on the startline.

So let´s take a closer look…

Aquabike races with the biggest number of finishers in 2021

We should also consider that there has also been an open race besides the European Championships in Walchsee. With 48 finishers it would have been #6 in this list. And if you add the finishers of the European Championships and the open race, Walchsee would have been clear number two. Although there was also an additional open race at the Spanish Aquabike Championships in Bilbao. But this one had only 10 finishers. So with a total of 104 finishers it still would be less than the 136 aggregated finishers of Walchsee.

You may notice that all of those races are middle distance races – except the World Championships which is carried out over the full distance. So let´s take a look at the smaller races over the shorter distances. Are there also some races with more than a handful of aquabike athletes? Let´s find out…

Standard Distance Aquabike Races with most finishers in 2021

OK, one can argue if the “Sprint+” Aquabike race at Cotswolds Lake really classifies as “Standard distance”. With a swim of 750 meters and a 39 km bike course it´s kind of a mixed distance race. But since we classify all races up to an overall distance of 30 km as sprint distance, it falls into the standard distance category in our classification. And for the other #1 of in this category, we might should add that the aquabike race over the standard distance at Lough Cutra Castle Triathlon was also the national Irish Aquabike Championships. However… it´s certainly good to see that there are indeed also quite a few aquabikers competing at smaller races.

Sprint Distance Aquabike Races with most finishers in 2021

Now this one is also interesting. The sprint distance race with the most finishers was the one at the Deva Divas Triathlon – a race for women only. That lead me to the find of another interesting statistical fact. In 2021 sprint distance aquabike races had more female finishers (145) than male finishers (139). Although the number of male finishers over longer distances might be significantly higher than the female ones, it´s still worth noting that the female quota in aquabike races is significantly higher than in triathlon. So if you want to bring more women into multisport, you might should consider adding an aquabike option to your triathlon event.