PACTRAC stars qualify for the 2027 European Championships in Austria

Sophie Robotham, Simon Hoppe and Steve Hope all took part in a race at Mallory Park racetrack over the weekend to book their places in the Euros. They join clubmate Jake Siddons who had qualified from a previous event.

The motor racing track at Mallory Park has a large lake in the middle, big enough for the 750-metre swim. With the European Sprint Championships being draft-legal on the bike, the three qualifying races tend to be the same. As such Mallory Park is a perfect venue, which saw cyclists racing directly against one another and forming groups over the 10-lap bike section.

The run again used the tarmac on the circuit with runners running out-and-back four times.

This was the third and final qualifying race and all 3 PACTRACers were relying on this as their only chance to progress. Robotham had her usual fast swim and came out of the lake second in her age group - a position that she held throughout the race. She will now be looking to improve on her fourth place at this year's European Championships.

Hoppe took the fourth of four Euros places on offer and, after another good swim, he moved up on the bike and finished with a 3.1 mile run in 21:50 minutes. Hoppe has represented Team GB over 30 times and will be looking to at least match his three third places.

Hope finished fifth at Mallory Park, 39 seconds behind fourtth place and an automatic qualification. After a good swim and bike, he started the run in third but was caught and overtaken by two athletes in his age group. With the next athlete closing the gap, but still 36 seconds behind, Hope took one of the four rolldown places based on times over the three-event series.

11 PACTRAC swimmers took part in the various swims at Rutland Water; eight of them in the 2.5-mile event, where Julia Kingsley led the team in 20th place overall, winning her age group in a time of 1:11:33.