Un tricolor podium. On Saturday in Munich, Frenchman Léo Bergère was crowned European triathlon champion, where the French team achieved the treble. With Pierre Le Corre, second, and Dorian Coninx, third, the Blues grabbed the podium after a completely mastered race. After taking the lead in a group of twelve breakaways on bikes, the tricolor trio provoked the selection from the first kilometers of running. Léo Bergère took off two laps from the finish on a hill on the very uneven course.
Behind Pierre Le Corre, inserted, the Hungarian Csongor Lehmann, last to accompany the three Blues, yielded in the final against Dorian Coninx. The 26-year-old from Isérois signed his first victory at the highest senior level after a brilliant last few months. In the absence of the Norwegian Olympic champion Kristian Blummenfelt, Léo Bergère has asserted himself this season as one of the very best on the world circuit (WTCS), in which he occupies second place.
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Shepherdess, rising star
Missed the Tokyo Olympics (21e) like the rest of the France team, Bergère was not a member of the bronze medal-winning mixed relay in Japan. With seven podiums in nine WTCS races since, the one who was more of a cycling specialist in his early days felt a “click”, in his own words.
Pierre Le Corre was defending champion, Dorian Coninx, bronze medalist with the mixed relay in Tokyo. The double world champion Vincent Luis had chosen to preserve himself for the end of the season after a tachycardia in the race in May. With this title, the rising star Léo Bergère asserts himself as one of the best triathletes in the world in this Olympic format (1,500 meters of swimming, 40 kilometers of cycling and 10 kilometers of running) with New Zealander Hayden Wilde, whom he is trailing in the WTCS standings, and Briton Alex Yee, absent after his victory over Wilde at the Commonwealth Games.
There are two rounds left in mid-October and then in early November before the grand final in Abu Dhabi, where Bergère will be in the race to clinch the world title.
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