In his third race of the 2023 season, Wright captured yet another podium finish, this time at the very top! Fresh off the heels of a 3rd place finish at the 2023 African Triathlon Cup M’Diq in Morocco, in less than a week Wright returned to Africa to take 1st in the 2023 Africa Triathlon Cup Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt.
In M’Diq, the Olympic distance course of a 1500m swim, 40km bike, and 10 km run was a tough test with hometown favourite, world-ranked number 16 Jawad Abdoumola, along with a number of the world’s top 100 ranked athletes in the 55-man pool. Wright started the swim very well to emerge out of the choppy Mediterranean Sea swim in 3rd position where he along with approximately 20 athletes formed the lead bike group onto the flat and fast bike course which included pre-race favourite Abdoumoula and WTCS Hamburg winner - Tim Hellwig from Germany. Wright noted, “I knew I had to use my bike strength to try to soften the rapid run legs of Abdamoula, so I continued to push the pace hard over the 40km ride.” Wright managed to narrowly avoid two big crashes on the last lap of the bike leg to take the lead into transition onto the 10km run. After the 1st lap of 5, joined by Tim Hellwig from Germany and Patigionas Bitados from Greece, the trio worked together for 2 more laps to run away from the rest of the field with the podium decided. Bitadoes led the charge with a huge push 6km into the run but was unable to cross the line first as Hellwig outsprinted Bitados for first place. Wright ran strongly to finish and gain the 3rd spot on the podium gaining crucial Olympic points to jump from World rank 127 to 110.
4.5 days later, Wright returned to compete in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt - a sprint distance of 750m swim, 20km ride, and 5km run - with 55 men on the start line. With another great swim, Wright exited the water in 2nd place behind Martin Demuth from Austria and was joined by 6 athletes onto the very windy cycle including Bitados, silver medallist from M’Diq, arguably the biggest competition for Wright. With high winds and heat playing a significant factor, Wright admitted he had a below-par transition and got onto the run in 6th place, with Bitados leading the pack. Wright managed to make up ground quickly to get himself into 2nd place behind Bitados for a tight chase to the finish. Favourably for Wright, Bitados made a slight wrong turn onto the final lap on the run, which allowed Wright to take advantage with 2km to go, extending the lead to win and capture maximum Olympic points by 20 seconds over Bitados, with Austrian Tjebbe Kaindl taking 3rd.
This has been an amazing season for Wright so far with 3 podium finishes in his three races for 2023. He was able to capitalize on earning valuable ranking points within the first Olympic qualifying period for Paris 2024 (which culminates on May 26th) where his World and Continental rankings now stand at 101. Next is the 2nd Olympic qualifying period that runs until May 2024, with his next two Olympic points races at the Reszow European Cup in Poland on June 11th, and Kitzbuhel European Cup in Austria on June 18th. Wright will return to the region of the Americas where he will look to gain the first medal in triathlon for Team Barbados at the Central America and Caribbean Games in El Salvador on July 5th
Wright expressed his thanks to the Barbados Olympic Association, Barbados Federation of Island Triathletes, and the Arts and Sports Foundation, for their support.