While the triathlon and aquabike racing season is long over in Europe, some athletes still have a season highlight coming up next weekend. The World Triathlon Championship Finals will host the first ever Aquabike World Championship over standard distance, taking place on Saturday, November 26th in Abu Dhabi.
The Spanish town Sitges, about 30 km from Barcelona, was host town of the final race of the aquabike season 2022 in Europe. 32 aquabike athletes finished what was not only the last but also one of the most demanding aquabike races of the season.
While the triathlon and aquabike racing season has already ended in most parts of Europe we had the penultimate aquabike race in Spain last weekend. Or actually races. The ICAN Triathlon Gandia on the Spanish east coast south of Valencia offered aquabike option over the middle distance as well as over the long distance. With rather big numbers of aquabike athletes in both races we saw some remarkable performances and close finishes.
OK, this one comes a little late. But we are currently super busy working on a huge update of aquabike.world. So bear with us, it will pay off 😉. Nevertheless we want to honor the performances of aquabike athletes over the last few weeks. While we had the European Championships in Bilbao (see our race report) there were two more middle distance races in Spain and the final races of the aquabike season on the British Island.
Over the last few weeks we have seen quite some changes at the top of the men´s as well as the women´s rankings. But the new leaders of the rankings are there to stay for a while. At least until the end of the year.
It´s been a turbulent racing week at the European Multisport Championships in Bilbao. With almost 300 athletes starting the race, the aquabike race attracted way more athletes than the World Championships in Samorin about a month ago and also way more than any other European Aquabike Championship race before. The feedback of the athletes came out a little mixed though. But it was certainly a race with impressive performances, and well deserved old and new European Champions.
Four days left until aquabike athletes will compete in the second big race of the season. The Aquabike European Championships take place in Bilbao this Saturday. Certainly an iconic location for what is for most participating athletes the big final of the racing season. In our preview we take a closer look at the swim, the transition, the bike course and – of course – the final run to the finishline. Will the last few metres off the bike again bring some significant changes in the race results? At least chances are good, that the influence of this little but controversial part of the race will be not as big as at the World´s in Samorin.
Well, at this point it almost seems like a weekly déjà vu since the top position in the men´s ranking changed almost every week since the World Championships in August. But every athlete who makes it to the top certainly deserves some spotlight. Especially the athlete who is the new #1 in this week´s ranking since he´s the most successful athlete since we started to track the results of aquabike races in Europe by the start of the 2021 race season.
Wow, what a spectecular weekend of aquabike racing it was! We had lots of races with big fields of aquabikers all over Europe. While the National Aquabike Championships of Slovakia took place just outside Bratislava, we also had an Aquabike race 70 km further up the Danube River at the Vienna Triathlon. We also had races with many aquabike athletes in France and also a race in Portugal.
The big points were made in England though. We did not only have the biggest race of the season (by number of athletes), but also one of the biggest middle distance races as well as the hardest aquabike race on the calendar on the British Island.
For the longest time of the year last year´s World and European Champion Adam Lambrechts had a safe lead in the Aquabike Ranking Europe due to his outstanding performances in the two championship races. But after he wasn´t able to defend his title at this year´s World´s in Samorin, the top rankings got significantly closer.
So it was Peter Schott from Austria, who got into the top position two weeks ago. But he couldn´t stay in the place in the sun for very long. But it wasn´t Nathan Morgan who I mentioned last week as potential new #1 after the Europeans in Bilbao. At least not yet, since the European Championships are still two weeks away. Instead the new leader in the men´s ranking comes from Germany.