After a disappointing race in the individual men’s event, Tyler Mislawchuk, the winner of the Tokyo Test Event in 2019 has pulled out of the mixed team relay due to an achilles injury, according to Triathlon Canada officials. He will be replaced on Canada’s mixed team relay by Alexis Lepage, his training partner.
“At the direction of team doctors, Tyler Mislawchuk has withdrawn from the mixed team relay event on Saturday at the Olympic Games,” said Triathlon Canada’s High Performance director, Eugene Liang. “Unfortunately, during the individual race, Tyler aggravated his achilles tendon, which ultimately led to some cramping during the run portion of the race due to compensating for the pain. Since the completion of the individual race, we have been working with our medical team to mitigate the irritation in his achilles tendon, but unfortunately there is still some risk of further damage to the achilles should he start. Tyler is a world class athlete who is driven to perform. Our number one priority is to always protect the health of our athletes. This decision is not made easily in light of how competitive all our athletes are.”
Mislawchuk competed in his second Olympics in Tokyo – he finished 15th in Rio as well. In 2017 both Mislawchuk and Lepage were part of the Canadian team that finished fifth at the Mixed Relay World Championship. They were joined on that team by the two women who will be competing in Tokyo – Joanna Brown and Amelie Kretz.
“It’s devastating not to have the opportunity to line up with my teammates this weekend in the Olympic debut of the mixed team relay due to injury,” said Mislawchuk. “It will be tough watching from the sidelines and not being able to contribute. That said, this also presents an opportunity for my friend and training partner Alexis to compete in the Olympics. I know he is up to the task and will make Canada proud. I will be supporting my teammates in their final preparations. and will be cheering them on with the rest of Canada.”
