Gomez and Frodeno duke it out
The ITU Dextro Energy World Championship Series is entering crunch time, as Germany’s Jan Frodeno and Javier Gomez (ESP) duel for the title with just two rounds of the seven-race series remaining
The ITU Dextro Energy World Championship Series is entering crunch time, as Germany’s Jan Frodeno and Javier Gomez (ESP) duel for the title with just two rounds of the seven-race series remaining.
After a below-par 2009 Frodeno has enjoyed a highly successful 2010 season, scoring a win in Seoul, Korea and three top six placings. The 194cm tall Olympic Champion leads the series with 2767 points, 195 ahead of Gomez. However, with races in Kitzbühel, Austria on August 14 and Budapest, Hungary on September 11 still to go, he will have to work hard to stay ahead of the 2008 World Champion.
“This season was all about regaining focus and finding the track to success,” says Frodeno, “not on a day-to-day basis but consistently over a whole season.”
The 27-year-old Spaniard started the year with a niggling hip injury, which caused him to miss the opening race in Sydney. He has steadily improved winning the previous two WCS races in Hamburg and London and leaping up the overall series standings to close in on Frodeno.
“I’ve been really busy since London,” says Frodeno. “My coach Roland has really put me through the paces and we figured we’d need to refresh my base training. I’ve put in a lot of hours!”
While both athletes are supported by and train with Suunto heart rate monitors, they have different styles of triathlon racing – Frodeno’s fast finishing sprint has helped him to victory on numerous occasions, while Gomez prefers to distance his rivals much earlier on the run sections.
“Javier has changed the sport in many ways,” says Frodeno. “As a competitor you just have to like the guy. He’s always friendly and a super tough racer who deserves a lot of respect.”
With the Austrian round of the series fast approaching and the Grand Final in Budapest four weeks later, how does Frodeno see the season playing out?
“My focus clearly lies on Budapest, but I believe that every athlete should race every race on the series to provide full transparency for spectators,” he says. “This is one of my main reasons for going to Kitzbühel. In saying that, I won’t hold back either!”
ITU Dextro Energy WCS Overall standings
1 Jan Frodeno (GER) 2767
2 Javier Gomez (ESP) 2572
3 Alexander Brukhankov (RUS) 2388
Matt Baird
Editor of Cycling Plus magazine 
