The quartet of Barclay Izzard, Sophie Alden, Connor Bentley and Sian Rainsley capped off their European Games by securing a silver medal for Team GB, with Rainsley overturning a 13 second deficit to finish just behind Norway, who took three gold medals from the Games.

Izzard started things off for Great Britain and exited the water alongside Switzerland’s Adrien Briffod, 16 seconds off the early pace set by Gergley Kiss of Hungary. The Brit quickly overcame that deficit and was amongst the front pack, which saw 11 riders separated by just three seconds, before he took a fall into T2. He was able to continue though but could not stick with the leaders and handed over to Sophie Alden 22 seconds off the lead.

She worked hard on the swim and the gap was soon down to just seven seconds and, like Izzard, was at the front of the field during the bike. A crash then left Alden out in front with eventual winners Norway as well as Hungary. She dropped back on the run though with Italy’s Verena Steinhauser, who had been involved in the earlier crash, now taking the lead. At the second hand over it was Luxemburg who led thanks to Jeanne Lehair’s efforts in the latter part of the run.

Bentley was the next athlete up for GB and entered the water 25 seconds off the lead, a gap that was reduced by nine seconds as he left the water. At the 2.75km stage of the bike the Brit had reduced the gap even more and was now in sixth place with the top nine separated by just 15 seconds, with a large gap back to 10th placed Ireland. Into T2, Norway’s Casper Stornes and Italy’s Gianluca Pozzatti had pulled away, creating an eight second gap back to the rest of the pack, which included fifth placed Bentley. The Norwegian burst away at the end of the run to hand over to elite women’s race winner Solveig Lovseth.

Rainsley headed into the swim well within medal contention as she was just 13 seconds behind in fifth with athletes from Denmark, Hungary and Switzerland for company. By the end of the swim Rainsley had battled her way up to second place, where, after trading top spot with Lovseth and Spain’s Cecilia Santamaria, she remained until the start of the run.

Exiting transition Rainsley was still just behind Lovseth, with the duo being joined by Hungary’s Marta Kropko and Switzerland’s Nora Gmur in a four-way shootout for the podium places. As Lovseth and Rainsley traded first and second place on the run, Gmur dropped out of the battle, with Kropko also dropping back from the leaders. The Brit continued to push hard to the line but was unable to deny Lovseth a second gold medal at the Games, finishing second and securing Team GB’s second ever European Games triathlon medal.

Rainsley said: "It was incredible coming down that blue carpet. I love racing with these guys and to come home with a medal at the end of the Games is really cool."

Izzard added: "I had a bit of a nightmare in T2 getting knocked off, but I had to try and recover and do as best I could to get Sophie back into the race at the first hand over. 

"To come away with a silver medal is amazing."

Images by World Triathlon and European Games 2023