1991 ITU Triathlon World Championships

This was the first worlds that I watched on Eurosport. We paid for a subscription at the student house I was sharing in Eastbourne. It was tough to get near the telly though. As one of my housemates was a Yorkshireman and Leeds United were heading for the Division 1 title that season.

This is my second favourite draft-free Worlds. After Avignon. But non-drafting was unsustainable in my opinion. Unless they used a time trial or small-field format. Hence, I wasn’t upset when the World Cup Series took the first steps and went draft-legal from Round 2 in 1994.

Then, after the Olympic decision in September 1994 there was no turning back. The full World Cup Series and one day Worlds in Cancun were both draft-legal in 1995. The FGP and Bundesliga then went DL in 1997.

Unlike the Worlds in Orlando in 1990, this was a much fairer race for the women’s and men’s leaders. As Mike Pigg says in the article below from the December 1991 issue of Triathlete (USA): “The young kid took it. Yeah, I’m bummed. But I’ll get over it; it was a race to remember.”

Here’s another reminder of how good the 220 long-form race reports were. Before the internet. This is all we had to understand the racing. They really tried to develop a story. Setting the scene. Exploring back-stories and controversies. Providing play-by-play race commentary.

Images: Triathlete (USA) December 1991. 220 (UK) Nov/Dec 1991