Some of the world’s best triathletes are in town and ready to kickstart their T100 Triathlon World Tour campaign in the heart of Singapore. The season-opening Singapore T100 will take place in the stunning Marina Bay on April 5 and 6 beginning with the Women’s Pro race on Saturday (5 April) followed by the Men’s Pro race on Sunday.

The Singapore T100 is a multi-sport festival featuring various events for people of different fitness levels. Besides the Pro races, over 7,000 fitness enthusiasts are expected to gather at the F1 Pit Building on Sunday morning for the age-group races. Experienced amateurs can take on the 100km triathlon (2km swim, 80km cycle, 18km run) on a similar route as the Pros, while others can take on one of two Duathlon races – Standard (4km run, 32km cycle, 6km run) or Long (8km run, 64km cycle, 10km run). The Music Run on Saturday evening will see runners take on the 5km fun run grooving to powerful beats blasted by speakers lined on the route.

To facilitate the smooth running of the event, the following roads are closed on Saturday 5 April from 11am to 10pm and on Sunday 6 April from 3am to 7pm: Bayfront Ave, Sheares Avenue, ECP Exits 14, 14A & 15, Rochor Road, and Ophir Road. Additional roads closed on Sunday are Nicoll Highway and Republic Ave.

Reigning T100 men’s world champion Marten Van Riel will begin his title defence amid a star-studded line-up in Singapore. Among those joining him in the stacked field are Singapore T100 defending champion Youri Keulen and as well as Paris Olympics triathlon silver and bronze medallists Hayden Wilde and Léo Bergère. The women’s Pro race is equally competitive with Australian Ashleigh Gentle aiming for a hat-trick of titles in Singapore. But she will face stiff competition from Olympic silver medallist Julie Derron and Tokyo 2020 Olympic champion Flora Duffy.

Ahead of the T100 weekend, the triathletes participated in several community activities around the island in collaboration with other sports events taking place in Singapore this week. In town for the HSBC SVNS Singapore at the National Stadium this weekend, the Great Britain women’s rugby team hosted their T100 compatriots Lucy Charles-Barclay, Kate Waugh and Jess Learmonth at Tanglin Junior School on Wednesday (3 April), with the triathletes swapped bike turbos for spin passes.

Meanwhile, German Ironman 70.3 World Champion Rico Bogen and 2024 Miami T100 champion India Lee attended an event marking 100 days to the World Aquatic Championships that will take place in Singapore from 11 July to 3 Aug. The triathletes were part of three teams that kickstarted the event’s first community programme – the SG60 Swim Challenge, which aims to encourage more people to pick up swimming.

The 2025 T100 Triathlon World Tour will take place across nine races, including the return to Singapore to start the new series. It will then go to San Francisco (31 May-1 June), Vancouver (13-15 June), France (27-29 June), London (9-10 August), Valencia (20 September), Lake Las Vegas and Dubai (15-16 November). Before the climax in Qatar for the new Qatar T100 Triathlon World Championship Final (12- 13 December) following a five-year partnership with Visit Qatar.

Says Rico Bogen: “It’s my first time here in Singapore and it’s cool. I like the heat and humidity and Asian food is really good. Up until 16-years-old, I was competing as a professional swimmer and 200m backstroke was my best discipline before I turned to triathlon. Hosting the World Championships is the most important race so it’s very cool the World Aquatic Championships are here. As an aspiring professional swimmer one of my goals was to compete at a World Championship level race. It was cool to see all ages getting involved, including a 79-year-old woman in another relay team.”

Says Ashleigh Gentle, who won the Singapore T100 Women’s Pro race in 2024: “Singapore is the first race of a long season, so we’ll be looking to chip away and make some gains throughout the year as well. It’s really hard to answer the question of how my training is going because I feel like it’s been a bit of a grind, I’ve been in a bit of a big block after coming off a break. I kind of hit the ground running pretty quickly and I find training in summer in Queensland really demoralising most of the time. So, I mean, there’s definitely been some good parts and especially in the swim, I was surprised myself a little bit. The bike’s been fairly good. And the run too, just like, you know, bringing up the hours and Ks each week, like fairly quickly. But I mean, you know, it’s hard to hit pretty fast paces at the moment when it’s so hot and humid. Every year it’s the same. I kind of have not much confidence in my fitness at the start of the year. And although I am sometimes a little bit rusty pretty early on, I feel like training in these conditions actually gets you quite strong and a lot fitter than you think you are.”

“Singapore is definitely one of the hardest races on the circuit. It’s one that you have to definitely train pretty specifically for. You can’t go there unprepared. You have to be ready for the heat and humidity. I like the heat, so it gives me motivation to go into a race like Singapore because I feel like I can thrive and hopefully other athletes can hurt a little bit more than me. I’ve won it two completely different ways. Singapore is definitely one of the hardest races on the circuit. You can’t go there unprepared. You have to be ready for the heat and humidity. Knowing that I can race well in the conditions that Singapore’s in. I know the course exceptionally well. I like the heat. I like the heat. It’s probably the most brutal test. It would definitely hurt me to lose the title of T100 Singapore champion. I would like to go into a race like Singapore thinking that I would definitely have an advantage. I’m going to be prepared. The goal for 2025 is to try and become the T100 world champion.”

Says Youri Keulen: “So first of all, I absolutely love to come back. When I came here and I arrived from the airport, I had butterflies in my belly, and I was like, ‘This was an insane day.’ I was so proud of what I achieved that day, and it felt like I’m back at the place where I belong so I love to be back. This morning, I did a run, and all the memories came back so I’m very happy to be here again. Do I put pressure? To be honest, not really. That I won last year doesn’t mean that I’ll win this year. I’m going to try and do my best to do it, and I hope I do, but that doesn’t guarantee anything.”

“There’s a quote that a coach once said to me: the fact that you prepared well doesn’t mean that you deserve to win. You will need to bring it on race day to get there. That’s the most important thing for me – the fact that I prepared well, the fact that I won here last year, doesn’t mean that I can win this year. It’s just on me on race day to show that I can so I don’t really feel pressure.”

Photo Credit: T100

T100 Singapore Race takes place on 5th and 6th April 2025 around Marina Bay. More information available here.