Just 24 hours after T100 French Riviera, it’s the turn of the world’s finest short course athletes to strut their stuff around the the twin towns of Saint-Raphael and Frejus.
Some – Hayden Wilde being the headline example – will be racing both formats and in terms of the men’s race there’s every chance this could actually prove to be best field of the season.
That’s because Olympic champion Alex Yee races what is probably his only WTCS event of 2025 and he’s up against great rival Wilde as well as runaway series leader Matt Hauser.
The women’s side is equally stacked – Beth Potter wears #1 to signify the fact she currently tops the standings and she faces Cassandre Beaugrand, who took gold on home soil in Paris last summer, and every other WTCS winner this year.
This is race five of seven regular-season WTCS events before the Grand Final in Woolongong and here’s the key info…
Start time and how to watch live
The action gets under way on Sunday 31st August at 14:45 local time (CEST) with the elite men. That’s 13:45 UK time, 8:45 Eastern and 05:45 Western. The elite women then go off at 16:30 local time.
You can watch all the races live on TriathlonLive.tv. A subscription is required.
Course and format
It’s Sprint rather than Olympic distance which should make it a fraction more manageable for those athletes also racing over 100km on the Saturday.
That means a 750m one-lap ocean swim in a clockwise direction from the beach in St Raphael, Plage du Veillat.
The route from the swim exit to transition is approximately 220m and is on a carpeted footpath. There is a short section of sand from the swim exit to the footpath before heading east towards T1.
The bike course consists of four anticlockwise laps of 3.8km in St Raphael with the last lap of 4.8km ending in T2 in Base Nature.
The run course is a three-lap course of 1.66km – athletes will run through transition on every lap in a clockwise direction.. On the last lap athletes will pass through transition and make a right U-turn onto the finish chute.
Elite Men
As we mentioned at the start this is likely to be the only Alex Yee vs Hayden Wilde vs Matt Hauser showdown of the season so it’s one to relish.
It’s fascinating on every level too – anyone who thought Yee’s speed might have been blunted by tackling the London Marathon at the end of April had a wake up call when he absolutely bossed the opening Supertri race in Toronto.
And he’s since massively improved his 5k PB on the track to 13:13.
Wilde meanwhile made a remarkable recovery after he suffered multiple injuries when he was hit by a truck when riding in Japan. Less than 100 days later he made a triumphant comeback when winning T100.
He’s confident he can come out of Saturday’s T100 in good shape for a race not much more than 24 hours later but it’s clearly a big ask.
And Hauser has been the WTCS athlete of the season so far and has revised his plans to race here as he was set to stay in Australia until the Grand Final in Woolongong.
The only way he can improve his score ahead of that finale is with a win – and that would be a real statement now that he’s up against Yee.
It’s not just about those three though – we’ve also got WTCS Alghero hero Miguel Hidalgo, which means every winner so far this season lines up (Wilde won in Abu Dhabi and Hauser in Yokohama and Hamburg).
Vasco Vilaca is the man who pushed Hauser all the way in those two races and is another who will be confident of getting in the shake-up again.
Elite Women
It’s a similar story for the women:
WTCS Abu Dhabi – Lisa Tertsch, WTCS Yokohama – Jeanne Lehair, WTCS Alghero – Cassandre Beaugrand and WTCS Hamburg – Leonie Periault.
They are the four winners so far this season and every one of them travels to the French Riviera.
As does series leader – thanks to her consistency – Beth Potter.
So there’s no doubt this is the race of the season so far and it’s hard to pick a winner. Beaugrand will likely start as favourite but she’s not been quite as dominant in 2025 after what was a perfect 2024.
Lehair jets in from another victory at Supertri Chicago while Potter has enjoyed a long training block in St Moritz and looks to be peaking for when it really matters.
In short it’s a race to savour and there are plenty of other big names lower down the start list too.
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