Tokyo Triathlon Medalists Taylor Knibb, Morgan Pearson Lead 2024 Paris Team

Photo Courtesy: Benh

Tokyo Triathlon Medalists Taylor Knibb, Morgan Pearson Lead 2024 Paris Team

Taylor Knibb and Morgan Pearson, members of the United States’ silver-winning mixed relay in Tokyo, will return to the Olympics in Paris at the head of a five-strong delegation.

Kirsten Kasper and Taylor Spivey join Knibb on the women’s side, while Pearson will be accompanied in Paris by Seth Rider.

Triathlon will take place July 30-31 with the team event on Aug. 5 in Paris.

“This is an extremely talented and decorated team that brings a wealth of medal potential and experience into the Games,” Scott Schnitzspahn, USA Triathlon High Performance General Manager, said in a press release. “We have several athletes capable of earning an Olympic medal both in the individual events in Paris and in the Mixed Relay, and we are excited to see what they can accomplish. The depth of talent among our U.S. athletes is incredible, with more individuals deserving of a nod than spots available. I want to acknowledge the difficult decisions the Games Athlete Selection Panel faced to finalize this talented team. The future of Triathlon and our U.S. athletes is bright and we are all looking forward to seeing what unfolds this summer and beyond.”

Knibb and Pearson qualified last summer at the 2023 World Triathlon test event in Paris. Knibb occupies the rare position of competing in two disciplines, having won the women’s time trial at the USA Cycling National Championships last season to book a place on the bike. That native of Washington D.C. and graduate of Cornell has made 29 World Triathlon podiums with 14 wins. Knibb finished 16th, third among Americans, at the Tokyo Olympics.

Spivey finally gets her chance at the Olympics at age 33. She was fourth on the World Triathlon Championship Series in both 2022 and 2023, and she won Worlds medals on the U.S. mixed relay in 2020 (silver) and 2022 (bronze). The Redondo Beach, Calif., native swam collegiately at Cal Poly.

Kasper, 32, was selected like Spivey and Rider via discretionary selection by USA Triathlon’s Games Athlete Selection Panel based on results from May 2022 to May 2024. A standout runner at Georgetown who was part of the Hoyas’ 2011 NCAA cross country championship, she was identified through USA Triathlon’s Collegiate Recruitment Program in 2014. (That program also delivered Tokyo Olympian Summer Rappoport from a Big East School in Villanova.) The native of North Andover, Mass., helped the U.S. won Worlds gold in the mixed relay in 2016, silver in 2017 and bronze in 2018. She’s a 17-time World Triathlon podium finisher.

Pearson, 30, finished 42nd in Tokyo but has grown steadily since. He won bronze at the World Triathlon Championship Series in 2021 in Yokohama to get to Tokyo, then added a bronze in Leeds to be the first American male with multiple medals in the same season. Pearson hails from New Vernon, N.J.

Rider is a 27-year-old from Germantown, Tenn., who has been racing since age six, including at the 2014 Youth Olympic Games. A top U-23 athlete, he won bronze in the mixed relay at Worlds in 2022 and has also competed internationally in mountain biking triathlons.

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