Top American triathlete Morgan Pearson admits he questioned whether he deserved to be one of this season’s T100 hot shots.
Despite only coming into the sport in 2018, the now 31-year-old is a two-time silver medal winner at the Olympics having been part of the USA’s mixed relay teams in both Tokyo and Paris.
And last season saw him claim his first WTCS victory when he triumphed in Yokohama against a top-quality field. He also made his middle-distance debut at IRONMAN 70.3 Indian Wells, winning in eyecatching style with a 1:10 half marathon.
But despite that track record, he says in the latest edition of World Triathlon’s ‘Dare to Dream’ series that he was surprised when he was offered the T100 contract for 2025.
‘Surprised’
The full video is a fascinating one and is embedded below, with Pearson taking up the story as to how he came to be racing in T100 this season.
He explains: “T100 reached out and asked if I wanted to be a hot shot. I wasn’t really sure at first. I had to take a few days to think about it because it’s gonna be really high level racing – these guys are just absolute animals.
“I thought about it for a few days and I was like, this is what I want to do. I want to be really out of my comfort zone. I want to try something that I haven’t done before and push myself as an athlete and as a person.
“So I got back to them and was like, ‘hey, I would be interested’. And then they offered me the contract and I was really surprised in terms of like deserving it.
“I don’t know. I think the direction they were trying to go with the hot shots I mean, you can see it’s more short course guys, Hayden [Wilde] and Leo Bergere are coming off Olympic medals, so of course they definitely deserve it.
“And then, you know, Vince [Luis], he’s a legend of our sport, so he’s definitely someone who’s deserving.
“Maybe I’m a bit of the wild card or like the X Factor with the hot shots. I definitely feel like I have a lot to prove, but at the same time I’m not putting too much pressure on myself.”
‘Excited to see where this can go’
Pearson’s biggest strength is his run speed – he was quicker than anyone at T100 Vancouver and that pushed him up to seventh, following an eighth place on debut in San Francisco.
His swim is impressive too and has helped him get into T1 first in both races but he acknowledges that he needs to get quicker on the bike if he’s to turn top 10s into podiums.
By his own admission he went from first to 15th on the first bike lap at San Francisco and down from the lead pack to eighth early on in Vancouver.
He explained: You know, I swam growing up. I ran growing up. I didn’t bike growing up. I didn’t get a bike till 2018 when I started triathlon.
“So it is pushing me to be a better biker, there’s just no doubt about it when you’re racing these guys.
“And here I am just a beginner, racing for, you know, seventh, eighth – not being happy, but excited with the progress and excited to see where this can go.
“One place higher doesn’t sound like much, it could just be a different field. But I just think that it was more of a sign of the progress. And, I think that mindset is a healthy one.”
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