Reese Vannerson

Part of USA Triathlon’s Olympic and Paralympic development team, Project Podium, Vannerson travels from the US along with team-mate Carter Stulhmacher to compete for the all-American outfit RTS Warriors.

As an experimental partnership between SLT and USAT, it will be fascinating to see how the pair perform against the world’s best triathletes over the frenetic four-event series.

Vannerson certainly shouldn’t have any issues keeping up on the run. In the 2018 AAU Junior Olympics he ran 4:19.71 to win the 13-year-old boys’ 1,500m.

While studying at Strake Jesuit high school he set a Texas track state record in the 3,200m with a time of 8:49 and also became a two-time state champion in the 3,200m and 1600m, as well as a 10-time AAU Track & Field national champion.

Vannerson’s triathlon resume is also impressive. A USAT junior national champion, he placed third at last year’s World Triathlon Junior World Championships in Montreal and was sixth at the Junior world champs in Hamburg in July, ahead of team-mates Stulhmacher (seventh) and Luke Anthony (eighth).

Last year he outpaced the field to win a Europe Triathlon Junior Cup Düsseldorf, and stepping up to the senior ranks for the first time – and as the youngest competitor in the field – placed eighth in an Americas Triathlon Cup in Long Beach, California.

On being signed to Project Podium, Vannerson said: “Since I was 8, I have raced triathlon. Since I was 15, I wanted to be able to do it as a living, and today is the day I can finally say that is what I am going to do.”