Lausanne has long been the deliverer of great events. World Championships have been held there on more than just a few occasions, with medals being fought for over the standard distance and also in the Mixed Relay format.
This weekend will see a welcome return to the schedule with the 2017 Lausanne ETU Triathlon Junior European Cup. Click here for the Athletes' Guide.
Racing will be over the sprint distance and will follow routes familiar to those who have raced here on the past. The Junior European Cup forms just a small part of the massive programme for the weekend that will see some 2,000 athletes race around the city.
Working to a tight schedule in the knowledge that everything goes like clockwork in Switzerland, the Women race first at 12:45, with the men starting at 13:45. Both races are on Saturday.
Coming to the race and in great form is an impressive line-up for both men and women and with the water at 23.8C at the moment, it looks very likely that it will be a non-wetsuit swim, so easy to follow your favourite athletes from start to finish.
For the women, 52 athletes from 17 nations, including visitors from Chile, New Zealand and the USA, will compete. A massive team comes from Great Britain and amongst them comes Kate Waugh reigning European Junior Champion. She will do battle with French athlete and winner of the bronze in Kitzbühel, Jessica Fullagar, so we can expect to see some exciting and very competitive racing. Swiss hopes will rest upon Jasmin Weber who will have to race well if she is to get ahead of the British and French athletes.
Austria is currently riding high on the Junior Rankings and with a bronze in Riga recently, Magdalena Früh could advance the team further ahead. Another British athlete to watch out for is Erin Wallace. Silver in Holten this year at the start of July with the second fastest run split. A good swim and a solid bike, she will be in for a good chance of a top five, if not the podium.
For the full start list, please click here.
The men’s race will see 74 athletes leap into the lake. 19 nations, including Australia, Bermuda, Mauritius, New Zealand and the USA, will go for the medals and points.
It will be an interesting race between GB’s Ben Dijkstra and Portugal’s reigning European Junior Champion, Vasco Vilaça as the pair have not met since Vilaça so narrowly won gold in Kitzbühel. Dijkstra’s disrupted final run in Holten amongst the older Elite athletes, showed us once more that his has stunning pace over the final 5k. These two at the front end of the race will be the ones to watch. With such a large field, there could be any number of changes to the running order as the athletes negotiate the course, and we can expect to see some break away attempts on that 10% climb on the bike.