Gisborne triathlete Tayler Reid misses selection for Paris Olympics

Gisborne's Tayler Reid in action during the triathlon mixed team relay at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham. Reid is a reserve for the New Zealand team for the 2024 Paris Olympics and will be helping the team prepare. Photo / Photosport

Gisborne triathlete Tayler Reid is disappointed at not making the New Zealand Olympic team but his training continues unabated.

His coach, Stephen Sheldrake, who is also the high-performance manager for Triathlon New Zealand, said Reid found out “a week or so ago” he was not in the team.

“The sport nominates athletes and the New Zealand Olympic Committee selects [the team],” Sheldrake said. “He’s obviously disappointed not to make the team. It didn’t swing his way this time but it was very close. It’s a competitive team to get into.”

Reid has been named as the reserve for the men’s individual race and the mixed relay. He and the women’s reserve, Brea Roderick, will train with the team on the outskirts of Paris right up to the relay.

The team members are Dylan McCullough, a 23-year-old Auckland athlete who will be making his Olympic Games debut, Hayden Wilde, Nicole van der Kaay and Ainsley Thorpe.

Reid is altitude-training in Font-Romeu, a Pyrenees ski resort in southern France.

“He has nine days up there and then will come down to sea level and compete in a World Series race in Hamburg in a couple of weeks,” Sheldrake said.

Reid, 27, will be on hand should either of the two male triathletes pull up injured before the Olympic men’s race on July 30 or the mixed relay on August 5.

“While he won’t be in the [Games] village, he will be housed just outside Paris,” Sheldrake said.

“He’s had a really good start to the season . . . six or seven weeks in a row racing around the world.

“He most likely will do the Super League, which starts about 10 days after the Olympics.

“Triathletes go into their early 30s and then a lot of them get into longer-course racing.

“He [Reid] will definitely go through to the next Olympic cycle and try to get selected for Los Angeles.”

Reid has competed in two Commonwealth Games and one Olympic Games.

He was 11th in the individual men’s race and won a bronze medal as part of the New Zealand mixed relay team at the 2018 Commonwealth Games on Australia’s Gold Coast.

He was 18th in the individual men’s race and a member of the mixed relay team who were 12th at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics.

He was eighth in the individual men’s race and a member of the mixed relay team who were fourth at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.

Sheldrake is now based in Cambridge, where he and his family moved a year ago.

“I lived in Gisborne for 49 years and 11 months (not counting trips away). It was time for a change. My wife Ashleigh rides horses – Cambridge is the horse capital of New Zealand – and our kids are at university. It helps that my work is based here.”

Sheldrake is on the support staff for the New Zealand triathlon team and will link up with Reid in Europe before the Games.

The Paris Olympic Games are being held from July 27 to August 12. The triathlon races are on Tuesday, July 30, men’s individual (6pm NZ time); Wednesday, July 31, women’s individual (6pm); and Monday, August 5, mixed relay (6pm).