France’s Beaugrand wins gold after Seine suspense

PARIS: France’s Cassandre Beaugrand clinched victory in the women’s triathlon at the Paris Olympics on Wednesday, which finally began in the Seine after days of suspense over whether the river would be clean enough for athletes.

Beaugrand, 27, triumphed after a remarkable bunched finish, opening up a gap in the late stages of the run from Switzerland’s Julie Derron who finished second, and Britain’s third-placed Beth Potter.

That the race took place at all was a triumph and relief for organisers who have been sweating on the state of the Seine since last Friday when the French capital was deluged by rain during the opening ceremony.

The storm overwhelmed the city’s sewerage system despite a recent 1.4 billion euros ($1.5 billion) upgrade, leading to discharges of untreated faecal matter that sent E.Coli bacteria levels spiking above permitted limits.

Beaugrand said she “never doubted” that the swimming would go ahead despite warnings that it might be cancelled, which would have turned the race into a duathlon of only cycling and running.

“It would have been shameful for our sport... it would have been a disgrace,” she told reporters afterwards. After the race was given the go-ahead at around 4am (0200 GMT), thousands turned out to witness the competition through Paris’s historic streets which were slippery and hazardous after overnight showers.

Beaugrand was in contention from the start, remaining in touch with front-runner and defending Olympic champion Flora Duffy during the swim when many competitors reported being surprised by the strength of the river current.

She told France 2 television afterwards that she had vomited before the start for the first time in her career. Fellow competitor Georgia Taylor-Brown from Britain, the silver medallist at Tokyo 2020, had helped encourage her.

“She told me ‘It’s just a race, you can do it’,” said Beaugrand, who grew up near Paris but moved to Britain in 2023 and trains at Loughborough University. The women’s triathlon is the first event to take part in the Seine after the men’s event was postponed on Tuesday because of pollution problems.

The men began shortly after the finish of the women’s race, with all three medallists from Tokyo 2020 -- Norwegian Kristian Blummenfelt, Britain’s Alex Lee and New Zealander Hayden Wilde -- all in contention. Due to an exceptionally wet spring and start to summer, the Seine had been consistently failing water tests until the start of July.

Levels of the E.Coli bacteria -- an indicator of faecal matter -- had been 10 times higher than authorised limits on some days in June. Storms had threatened to wreak more havoc overnight on Tuesday-Wednesday, but deputy Paris mayor Antoine Guillou said there had been no discharges from the sewers.

“The rain was quite light and low in quantity,” Guillou, who is in charge of public sanitation, told AFP. It led to treacherous conditions during the 40-kilometre cycling race, with many competitors crashing on the wet cobbles, some of them more than once.

“I got caught behind a couple of crashes on the bike but managed to stay upright,” Potter told the BBC after winning her first Olympic medal. Many finishers said they had put pollution problems out of their minds as they dived into the Seine from a pontoon in front of the Alexandre III bridge. But they found the currents surprising strong after all training was cancelled this week and with the Seine flowing at two-three times its usual speed for this time of year.