Triathlon New Zealand Annual Report 2025 - Flipbook - Page 17
Age-Group
Under the leadership of Mel Saltiel the Age Group programme has
been thriving. It was great to see Age-Group World Championship
events returning to Oceania in 2025 with the World Triathlon
Championship Finals happening in Wollongong, Australia. This saw
a great jump in athletes qualifying and competing at the event. In
total we had 328 age-group athletes from 16 to 86 years competing
in a 2025 World Championship team in 2025. We had amazing
results across all our age-group teams, highlights include:
• The 328 athletes competed across 505 events across three
World Championships
• We saw our first athlete compete in the new T100 World
Championship
• 12 World titles were claimed by the NZ team plus 10 silver and
15 bronze
• Our para athlete Bruce Jordan continued to impress in the
Sprint Duathlon, Aquathlon and Long Distance Triathlon
Over 2025 we had 9 sanctioned events and the number
of endorsed events increased by 62% as we increased our
endorsement support of club events. We continue to sincerely
acknowledge the significant contribution of these Technical
Officials, who volunteer their time to uphold safe and fair
competition for all participants.
Paratriathlon
Paratriathlon continues to be a growing focus for Triathlon New
Zealand, with meaningful progress made over the past year to
strengthen pathways and visibility for athletes. A key priority
has been building stronger relationships with national para
sport organisations, and we now have established, collaborative
connections with Halberg, Paralympics New Zealand, and
World Triathlon. These partnerships are already improving
athlete identification, support alignment, and access to funding
opportunities, ensuring a more connected and sustainable pathway
into the sport. This has been further enabled by clubs such as
Canterbury and Rotorua Triathlon Clubs delivering adaptive
triathlons in their respective regions.
With the World Championships happening in Pontevedra, Spain;
Abu Dhabi, UAE and Lussail, Qatar in 2026 the age group
programme will continue to grow.
We have also made important strides in competition and
performance infrastructure. A dedicated paratriathlon category
was successfully delivered at the National Sprint Championships
at Tinman, providing athletes with the opportunity to gain points
Nationally, age-group racing throughout the 2024/25 season
towards international competition. In addition, targeted investment
delivered a vibrant and highly competitive calendar, with national
has enabled a New Zealand classifier to begin the process of
champions crowned across a range of distances and formats at
events nationwide. We extend our sincere appreciation to the event obtaining international qualification, as well as the identification
of potential medical classifiers in NZ. Triathlon New Zealand was
organisers who played a key role in hosting the 2024/25 Tri NZ
also successful in securing funding through Sport NZ’s Disability
Suzuki Series:
Inclusion Impact Fund, marking a significant step forward in
accelerating the development of paratriathlon nationwide. This
• Auckland City Triathlon Club (Sprint and Schools Duathlon)
investment recognises the progress already made in strengthening
• Triathlon Tauranga (Tinman Triathlon, Standard Distance)
partnerships and creating inclusive competition opportunities and
• SMC Events (Mount Festival of Multisport, Mid Distance)
provides a platform to build further momentum across the pathway.
• Challenge (Challenge Wanaka, Aquabike Qualifier)
Community Triathlon is hitting 2026 at full stride, strong, growing,
• Tri Sport Taupo (Kinloch Triathlon Festival, Aquabike Qualifier
and ready for what’s next.
and Aquathlon)
• SB Events (Napier Triathlon Festival, Sprint Distance)
• Southland Triathlon & Multisport Club (Schools)
• Xterra (Xterra Rotorua Festival, Cross Tri)
Technical
Thanks to the steady leadership and commitment of Ross Capill as
Technical Manager, the programme remains in a strong and wellsupported position. The number of TOs in 2025 was 61, with the
breakdown of these as follows:
GROWING * STRONGER * TOGETHER
Anna Russell
General Manager of Community
• World Triathlon 3B (highest level) = 2
• World Triathlon Level 3a = 3
• World Triathlon level 2 = 4
• World Triathlon Level 1 = 20
• Tri NZ Level 3 = 1
• Tri NZ Level 2 = 6
• Tri NZ Level 1 = 22
Triathlon New Zealand
Annual Report 2025
Page 17
