Chaos complete: Olympic men’s triathlon postponed to Wednesday, July 31

The water quality of The Seine has not improved in time and also today does not meet the set standards for a safe swim and therefore the Olympic men’s triathlon does not take place. The race that was actually scheduled to start at 8:00 a.m CEST. has now been moved to Wednesday, July 31, 10:45 a.m. CEST.

That the race is being rescheduled is not a big surprise: the water quality of the Seine has been poor for more than a hundred years, and in recent days the water quality has also been well below acceptable limits. Remarkably, World Triathlon consistently maintained that it had every confidence in a swim, despite the fact that both swim reccy’s were cancelled yesterday and the day before.

It is also remarkable that World Triathlon is now abandoning its own ‘Plan B’. Earlier it was communicated that if swimming could not take place today, the Olympic Triathlons would be moved to Friday, August 2, but that’s not the case: for now, the women’s race will still take place tomorrow (July 31, 8:00 a.m. CEST) and thus only the men’s race will be rescheduled. With a start time of 10:45 a.m CeST., the men’s race should take place almost immediately after the women’s race.

A duathlon-format is still on the table als alternative as well.