Wilde wins T100 Dubai a day after Abu Dhabi

Hayden Wilde won the T100 Dubai on Saturday 14 November 2026 at Al Mamzar, in a time of 3:11:43, less than 24 hours after finishing third in the World Series in Abu Dhabi. The New Zealander left his compatriot Kyle Smith second, 1:09 back (3:12:52), and Germany’s Mika Noodt completed the podium in third in 3:14:01.

In the women’s race, Britain’s Georgia Taylor-Brown won by ten seconds (3:35:19) from New Zealand’s Nicole van der Kaay (3:35:29). Spain’s Sara Pérez Sala came out of the water first and finished fifth, and Antonio Benito was tenth in the men’s race.

Wilde wins in Dubai a day after the Abu Dhabi World Series

Wilde was scheduled to race the sprint at the Abu Dhabi World Series on Friday 13 November and in Dubai about 18 hours later. The double required a waiver from World Triathlon, granted by its Technical Committee on Monday afternoon, 9 November, because the rules (section 2.5) limit racing within 24 hours of the start of one race and the start of the next.

It is Wilde’s third T100 victory this season, after those in Singapore and the French Riviera, and earlier he was third in San Francisco.

Men’s swim and bike: everything open until T2

The swim was held without wetsuits and with very little wind. At the halfway point Menno Koolhaas went through first, with Rico Bogen and Emilien Bourdon 2 seconds back and Wilde, sixth, 6 seconds back. Bogen came out of the water first (24:18), with Koolhaas 3 seconds behind and Antonio Benito third. Henry Räppo and Wilde followed, 6 seconds behind Bogen; Mika Noodt came out eighth, 11 seconds back, and Smith thirteenth, 23 seconds back.

Wilde passed Bogen on the long run to the transition area and reached the bike first, although he lost a few seconds putting on aero socks. Smith made the best first transition among the contenders. Over the 80 km of cycling, Wilde went to the front early, with Noodt around the 7 km mark and Smith soon alongside, in a lead group of about ten riders.

At 20 km Wilde was leading, followed by Smith, Noodt, Andrea Salvisberg, McDonald, Bogen and Räppo, with just 16 seconds between the seven. At 46 km five were left at the front: Bogen, Wilde, Noodt, Smith and Salvisberg. Räppo later rejoined the group and, with ten kilometres to go, six men fitted within 21 seconds.

Bogen entered T2 first. Noodt arrived 4 seconds back, Wilde 5, Smith 6 and Salvisberg 7. Koolhaas, who paid for a slow bike, arrived a long way back, and McDonald lost 2:13. Neither the men’s nor the women’s race had the RaceRanger electronic system because of a customs delay, so technical officials policed the 20-metre drafting zone by eye.

Wilde breaks away on the run with a possibly broken toe

Before heading out to run, Wilde told a cameraman: “I think I’ve broken my toe.” He went through T2 in 47 seconds and started running 2 seconds behind Bogen; Smith set off 8 seconds back, Salvisberg 10 and Noodt, fifth, 16.

Wilde and Smith ran together, shoulder to shoulder, for the first half. Around the halfway point of the run, Wilde accelerated. With seven kilometres to go he had 14 seconds on Smith and, with three and a half kilometres left, his lead was 35. Smith tried to hang on but could not hold the pace; he said afterwards that he knew from the start of the run that he would not be able to beat Wilde. Wilde ran the 18 km in 56:46.

For third place, Noodt and Salvisberg were separated by only 3 seconds with 7 km to go. Noodt pulled away and had a 38-second lead with three and a half kilometres to go. He was back at a race of this level four months after colliding with an ambulance while leading the IRONMAN 70.3 Swansea in July.

Podium and men’s results: Smith, Noodt and Benito, tenth

Smith had already been on the podium on the French Riviera and improved on that position in Dubai. Koolhaas came through with the best run split, 56:45, one second faster than Wilde, while Bogen, who led at the start of the run, dropped to ninth with a 1:02:54 run. From fourth to tenth, the results were as follows:

• 4th Andrea Salvisberg (3:15:12)
• 5th Menno Koolhaas
• 6th Henry Räppo
• 7th Gregor Payet
• 8th McDonald
• 9th Rico Bogen
• 10th Antonio Benito (3:22:06)

Antonio Benito finished tenth, 10:23 behind Wilde. He came out of the water third, rode 1:49:13 and ran 1:04:40. The triathlete from Tomelloso, long-distance world champion in 2024 and 2025, had 12 points and was twentieth in the series before Dubai, with only one T100 start in 2026. On the French Riviera in September he was ninth in 3:10:36, with a 1:42:08 bike (fourth-best split) and a 1:02:16 run (twelfth-fastest).

This season he won the Zarautz Triathlon, was third at IRONMAN Frankfurt and 39th at the IRONMAN World Championship in Hawaii in October, in 8:51:18. He entered Dubai through his PTO ranking, without an invitation.

Taylor-Brown wins by ten seconds with Pérez Sala first out of the water

Switzerland’s Julie Derron completed the women’s podium, third in 3:37:25. Sara Pérez Sala came out of the water first in 25:46. She set the pace early on, Kate Waugh moved ahead, and in the second kilometre the Spaniard regained the lead. Waugh came out 4 seconds back, Taylor-Brown 6 and Bianca Bogen 7. Caroline Pohle was fifth, 59 seconds back, and Derron sixth, 1:01 back, a loss of more than fifty seconds for the favourite.

Taylor-Brown made a 3:07 T1 and started the bike second, 2 seconds behind Pérez Sala and 4 ahead of Waugh. The other rivals were a minute or more back. The Briton passed the Spaniard before completing the first two kilometres of the bike. Around the 40 km mark, Pohle and Van der Kaay had already made contact with the lead.

At 60 km four were left at the front: Taylor-Brown, Van der Kaay, Pérez Sala and Pohle. Waugh lost a lot of time and Bianca Bogen dropped about two and a half minutes. Taylor-Brown tried to stretch her lead, but suffered cramp in her adductors, which she confirmed herself afterwards, and Pohle attacked near T2 to start the run in first place. The bike splits were: Pohle 1:58:50, Van der Kaay 1:59:14 and Pérez Sala 2:00:15, the third-best among the top ten.

Pérez Sala secures a top five: strong bike, tougher run

Before the race, Pérez Sala said: “Finishing in the top five would be a great result, but a top-ten place would also make me happy.” She also predicted: “I think a small lead group will form with Kate Waugh and me in it, although there will be other swimmers close by who are improving a lot. Racing without a wetsuit may increase the gaps.”

On the run she started ten seconds ahead of Taylor-Brown. At four kilometres the Briton was leading, with Van der Kaay 2 seconds back, the Spaniard 9 back and Pohle 30 back; Derron was 1:48 behind the lead. Taylor-Brown entered the last two and a half kilometres with a 27-second lead, which Van der Kaay cut to the final ten. The winner ran 1:04:37.

Pérez Sala went through tense moments: first Pohle and then Derron overtook her. Derron and Pohle then swapped positions and the Swiss secured the podium. Pérez Sala ran the 18 km in 1:08:19; Derron in 1:05:19 and Pohle in 1:08:07. She finished fifth in 3:38:50, 1:25 off the podium and 3:31 behind Taylor-Brown, and Pohle, fourth in 3:38:13, finished 37 seconds ahead.

The Spaniard arrived after winning Challenge Xiamen on 7 November for the second year running, in 4:00:04, 14:55 ahead of Australia’s Jasmine Brown. She was also third at Challenge Samarkand. In the T100 she had been sixth in Gold Coast, fifteenth in Pamplona (where she led the swim in 26:12 and ran 1:21:19, while Taylor-Brown won with a 1:09:40 run) and eleventh in Vancouver.

She had not been lucky in Dubai before. “It’s a race I always come to with a lot of enthusiasm, but it has never gone well for me. The heat has taken a heavy toll: last year I didn’t finish and the year before I finished with great difficulty,” she said before the race. And she added: “I hope the three weeks I’ve spent here putting up with these temperatures help me.”

T100 standings ahead of the Grand Final in Qatar

With 105 points, the maximum, Wilde heads into the Grand Final in Qatar on Friday 11 December with a 42-point lead over Smith, who has 63. Jake Birtwhistle is third with 59; before Dubai, Wilde led with 96. Birtwhistle, Lasse Nygaard Priester and Sam Dickinson did not take part. The three best races of the regular season count, plus the final. A win in Dubai was worth 35 points, second place 29 and third 26; the winner in Qatar receives 55.

In the women’s standings, Taylor-Brown moves into the lead with 96 points, six more than Derron (90). Bianca Bogen is fifth with 54, Pérez Sala sixth with 48 and Alanis Siffert seventh with 47. Before Dubai, Derron led with 64, Imogen Simmonds had 62, Taylor-Brown 61 and Pérez Sala was ninth with 34.

A new setting at Al Mamzar: course, conditions and race background

This is the first T100 Dubai at Al Mamzar; the previous two editions were held at the Meydan racecourse. It was the last race of the regular season before the Qatar final. The men’s race was added after the postponement, announced on 3 November, of the T100 in Saudi Arabia to April 2027. The PTO added the men’s race to guarantee the points criteria. For the first time this season, men and women raced at the same venue, with 19 men and 23 women on the start list.

The distance was a 2 km swim, 80 km bike and 18 km run. The swim consists of two laps, with a beach exit between them; the bike is four 20 km laps, and the run is four 4 km laps plus 2 km to join the circuit and reach the finish. The bike course is undulating and passes through Al Hamriya port and the Infinity Bridge, and the run is flat, on paths in Al Mamzar Beach Park. Pérez Sala explained before the race that the surface is tile rather than asphalt, and that the bike course looked fairly flat, with good asphalt, not very technical, and a straight with several speed bumps at the start.

The organisers give typical water temperatures of 28–29 °C and air temperatures of 25–31 °C. The broadcast began at 10:00 in Dubai (07:00 in mainland Spain), with the men’s start at 10:03 and the women’s at 10:08, and could be followed free on TriathlonLive.io. Dubai offered $275,000 in prize money per category, with $50,000 for each winner.

Julie Derron, Olympic silver medallist, defended her Dubai title five weeks after finishing third at the IRONMAN World Championship in Kona. Kate Waugh, the 2025 T100 world champion, did not make the podium again. Last year the men’s race was overshadowed by the lap-counting fiasco: Morgan Pearson was awarded the win and Noodt was officially second. The weekend continues on Sunday 15 November with the 100 km amateur race and a sprint, with more than 3,000 amateurs from more than 50 countries.