Commonwealth Games Mixed Relay Gold Up Grabs for Team Australia

Team Australia head into Sunday’s mixed relay race as defending champions, with two men from their Gold Coast victory four years ago, Jacob Birtwhistle and Matthew Hauser, joined by two of Friday’s women’s individual race Natalie Van Coevorden and Sophie Linn who both claimed Silver as part of Team Australia at the 2022 Hamburg World Triathlon Mixed Relay Series three weeks ago alongside Hauser.

Birtwhistle will lead out the Aussies and hand over to Van Coevorden, followed by Hauser and then Linn to bring the team home in the two women, two men super-sprint format in Sutton Park where each athlete will tackle the 300m swim, 5km bike, 2.1km run course before tagging their teammate.

The Aussie team are full of confidence after Friday’s Individual Triathlon events with Hauser’s inspiring Bronze medal performance, Birtwhistle in fourth and Linn storming home on the run to finish fifth and Van Coevorden among the leading swimmers in the Women’s.

“I think Team Australia can put together a really good performance, three weeks ago in Hamburg we were able to come second which was an outstanding result to get back on the Podium, so I think we’re going to be ready to go on Sunday,” said Linn.

“It’s so awesome to see Matt (Hauser) come third and Jake (Birtwhistle) come fourth, it was just so inspirational for us as we’re getting ready to line up to race.

“I think the team morale is really high right now, and we’re really coming together as a team, and showing everyone we’re ready to be back in the game again.”

Team England will be a formidable opponent, with red-hot duo of 2022 Men’s Games champion Alex Yee and silver medallist Georgia Taylor-Brown, not to mention several thousand cheering fans lining the route. Sophie Coldwell and Samuel Dickinson look likely to join them in a carbon copy of the WTCS Montreal relay line up that managed to qualify the first team for Paris 2024 last month.

Men’s silver medallist Hayden Wilde will be looking to power New Zealand to success after Friday’s dramatic finish, Dylan McCullough or Tayler Reid joining the world number one along with Nicole Van Der Kaay and Andrea Hansen.

The women’s Commonwealth Games Champion Flora Duffy will be the driving force behind Team Bermuda, along with the hugely experienced Tyler Butterfield and rising talents Erica Hawley and Tyler Smith. Bermuda finished fifth in 2018 ahead of the likes of Scotland and South Africa, both of whom will want to improve on their Gold Coast showings. The Scots can count on women’s bronze medallist Beth Potter, while South Africa have youth and experience on the men’s side in Jamie Riddle and a returning, if not fully fit, Henri Schoeman.

Canada’s Tyler Mislawchuk will want a good performance to help banish his misfortune after a mechanical ended his challenge on Friday, while Emy Legault looked in great form once again scoring an individual top 10, as did teammate Charles Paquet. Making their Commonwealth Games debuts are Team India, Team Barbados, Team Namibia and Team Trinidad and Tobago.