“I love the pressure and I love being hunted”. Hayden Wilde smashes the T100 Triathlon World Championship Final in Qatar

Hayden Wilde cruises to his sixth win from seven starts on the T100 Tour this year and calls out the short-course athletes he’d love to race at this distance, including Alex Yee and Matty Hauser.

With recovery from injury and a solid block of training behind him, Hayden Wilde cruised through to take the title at the T100 Triathlon World Championship in Qatar putting a victorious finish to his 2025 T100 season, while Kate Waugh took the women’s title.

“It’s pretty special from starting in Singapore, then being in hospital for a bit, and then coming back and winning a few races, and then finishing here in Qatar,” Wilde said. “It’s been a long season but it’s nice to finish up.

“I just came into this race with open eyes and I was like hey, I’ve made it back to racing fit and healthy, and that’s more of a title that I’ll take to the grave than obviously the T100 series. I’m really happy with how everything’s gone this year.

“I love the pressure and I love being hunted. Just kind of had to come in with a smile on my face and obviously, you know, pressure is good pressure of course, but I also love having it as well – it really fires me up to be the guy having a target on his back and having the ability to control the race as well. It’s a nice place to be for sure.

“I just want to see more short course athletes come and toss it up with us, you know, the likes of Matty Hauser and Alex [Yee] if those guys want to come over and have a bit of fun. I love this sort of racing, it really shows how good you can be individually on the bike and the run. There’s a few other short course guys who have been dabbling a bit as well like Miguel and Vasco. It will be nice to have those guys. People keep coming along and making this more of a competition and just keep raising the bar.”

What happened in the swim

France’s Vincent Luis and the USA’s Morgan Pearson got to work early in the 2km swim to create a leading group of eight including the Belgium pairing of Jelle Geens (2nd in the T100 Race To Qatar standings) and 2024 T100 World Champion Marten Van Riel. Meanwhile 5x T100 winner, New Zealand’s Hayden Wilde, was 40 seconds off the pace.

“It was a good swim, we were more or less close to the group, and I was happy with that,” said Wilde. “I don’t have a swim skin so I didn’t have to worry about that which is nice. It only took me a good few K to get to the bike but I knew Rico was behind me which was a good thing because we know he was going to come through and Mathis was going to be strong as well.

“We went off the front and wow that bike was hard. It was on and off, on and off. Got onto the run with a nice gap to the key runners in the competition. I looked back and it looked like Rico was having a good day out there on the run, and I was like I’ve got to keep my wits about me. Obviously Morgan was having a stormer on the first 15k and was able to hold on.”

What happened on the bike

Onto the 80km bike course, it wasn’t long before Wilde bridged to the front group, which also included cycling strongmen Mika Noodt and Rico Bogen of Germany and Van Riel with Pearson losing touch and France’s Mathis Margirier coming through.

Around half-way through the course, Bogen came down on a dusty corner but was quick to remount and regain position while Geens started to drop down the order.

What happened on the run

After leading into T2, Wilde was first onto the 18km run and seemingly ready for a procession fitting of his dominance throughout the 2025 T100 season. A few seconds behind him, Bogen charged out of T2 while a trio of Van Riel, Margirier and Noodt formed, running shoulder to shoulder. Behind, Geens was 2:18 in arrears with Perason at 2:43 – however the US-athlete soon established himself as fastest on course, dipping just below 3min per km pace.

With around 10km to go, Van Riel dropped a few metres picking up his special needs bottle while Margirier and Noodt stayed locked together. Van Riel made it back on just as they picked up Bogen, now running as quartet as they hit the half-way mark – 1:20 behind Wilde but with Pearson only another 25 seconds behind.

Pearson made the catch with around 7km to go, blasting through the group and moving from 6th to 2nd. Margirier tried to go with the move, distancing Noodt and Van Riel, but by 3km to go, the pair had once again overhauled the Frenchman. From there, Van Riel was first to make his move, powering away from Noodt to take a clear podium position for the first time in the run.

Despite the action behind, Wilde’s win was never in doubt. The Kiwi crossed the line to take his 6th victory of the season and the T100 Triathlon World Championship title having amassed a perfect score across 2025. Wilde takes $25,000 for the win in Qatar – added to the $125,000 already earned in race wins this year – and also bags $200,000 for winning the T100 Race To Qatar.

A strong finishers’ podium

Pearson ran hard to the line to take second place, moving himself up to fourth in the T100 Race To Qatar standings to secure $120,000 in addition to $17,000 on the day.

“I’ve been changing my run training the last couple of months,” Pearson said. “I was maybe a little bit off earlier on in the year so I switched things up at the end of the summer and I’ve been training like a monster for this race, putting it all in, every effort into training and I think it showed today. I just felt good and smooth and I really biked hard so to still come out with a fast run was nice, I was proud of myself.”

“I mean I could’ve asked for a win but Hayden is on another level right now, he deserves it. It’s honestly just an honour to race against him in this format so to come out second behind him is great. I’ve said this a few times, but this whole season I’ve just been trying to improve, I didn’t want to put pressure on myself. You know, I did the Olympics last year and that is such a high pressure situation and I just really wanted to find my love for this sport and triathlon and find the enjoyment again. And I think I did the past couple months and it’s showing. You’re having fun when you’re finishing on the podium.”

Pushing for third

Van Riel came home in third, ceding his 2024 world title, but taking 6th in the T100 Standings and earn $90,000 in addition to $13,000 for the podium.

“On the bike I was really struggling already,” said Van Riel. “The boys, the biker boys, were pushing really, really fast on the flat parts and I was struggling really hard. Coming onto the run I really didn’t have any legs anymore so I was happy to just follow the guys at the start. Every time someone kind of broke away on the run we caught them again. I was really happy to finish on the podium in the end.”

“Honestly, it’s been a frustrating season you know. I won the World Title last year and you set the bar really really high for yourself and maybe I was sometimes too unforgiving to myself because I was just not going well and I was very strict with myself and never happy. To finish the season obviously in the rankings, I think I will probably be around fifth, which is obviously a bit disappointing but I’m really happy to have finished the season off with a podium and hopefully that can be a step up for a better 2026.”

Noodt’s 4th place secured 2nd overall in the T100 Standings, consistency throughout the year earning him $170,000. Margirier rounded out the top-five, the Frenchman finishing the season in 7th place and taking home an $85,000 bonus.