The 2021 Collins Cup, the inaugural staging of the Professional Triathletes Organisation’s landmark team event, has been rescheduled to take place in Šamorín, Slovakia on August 28, 2021.

The best triathletes on the planet, led by the PTO World #1 ranked man and woman Jan Frodeno and Daniela Ryf, will now be looking to seize the spoils at Samorin.

The likes of Alistair Brownlee, Lucy Charles-Barclay, Lionel Sanders and Heather Jackson, as well as PTO 2020 Championship victors Gustav Iden and Paula Findlay, will also be hoping to join the battle as Teams USA, Europe and Internationals start to take shape.

The event will take place at the x-bionic® sphere, a world-class purpose-built sporting complex in Šamorín, which is a 50 minute drive from Vienna. The weekend will be an all-inclusive festival-like celebration of the sport of triathlon.

Collins Cup format

The race itself will be a middle-distance non-drafting event.

The event will consist of three teams – USA, Europe and Internationals. Each team will be made up of 12 PTO professionals (six men and six women).

Eight athletes, four men and four women, will earn a place on their respective teams by way of automatic qualification determined by using the PTO World Rankings.

The remaining four athletes, two men and two women, will be designated as “Captain’s Picks”, and will be selected by a committee of non-athlete members of the PTO Board, in consultation with the Team Captains.

An athlete from each of Team USA, Europe and the Internationals will battle against one another in an individual race of three, so there will be 12 separate race matches, each staggered 10 minutes apart.

The day before the race, the Team Captains will select their individual race match-ups via a draft mechanism.

For Match No.1, USA will first designate an athlete, then Europe will name an athlete, and finally the Internationals will name an athlete. For Match No.2, Europe will select first, then the Internationals, then the USA. For Match No.3, The Internationals will select first, then USA, then Europe. This process will be repeated until all 12 Race Matches are set.

Collins Cup Origin

The Collins Cup is inspired by, and named after, Judy and John Collins, who 40 years ago were instrumental in establishing the sport of triathlon. They did so by inaugurating a long-distance event on the idyllic shores of Hawaii, where they were stationed while John was a Commander in the US Navy.

Inspired by their recent experience in short-course triathlon in California, they designed a long-distance, around-the-island event in Hawaii, by adding a long bicycle leg to existing swimming and running events. The winner was to be considered the best all-round athlete.

Since that day, triathletes – male and female – have established themselves as some of the greatest athletes on the planet. From its earliest days, triathlon has included men and women racing the same distance, over the same course, on the same day, for equal prize money.

This is an important principle of the Collins Cup and it is the cornerstone of the philosophy of the Professional Triathletes Organisation.