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Rio Update: Canada’s Leslie Buchanan selected as national technical official

ITU World Championship men swim start 2012

From press release.

The ITU released the lists of the international and national technical officials for the 2016 Olympic and Paralymic triathlon events at Rio. Canadian Leslie Buchanan was selected and is one of two technical officials to have officiated at all triathlon events in Olympic history.

This is the fifth consecutive Olympics to host the triathlon since its debut at the 2000 Sydney Games.

The Technical Officials (TOs) were selected in accordance with ITU’s Technical Officials Appointment Policy, which is a multi-phase process that involves input from ITU staff, National Federations, the ITU Technical Committee and finally the ITU Executive Board.

ITU President Marisol Casado congratulates all those selected as a TO. “It is an extremely high honour to be selected as a Technical Official for the Olympics and Paralympics,” he said. “It takes an incredible amount of work to reach this level, and I congratulate all of the Technical Officials who will travel to Rio.”

The ITU strives for a balanced representation across the TO board. A total of 37 nations will be represented through TOs at the Olympic Games. For several nations, it is their first time being represented this way. There are 15 female and 25 male TOs.

At triathlon’s Paralympic debut, there will be 16 female and 26 male TOs.

The Olympic Games kick off in August. Canada has currently earned one male spot and three female spots for our triathletes, however this will change over the course of the next four ITU World Triathlon Series events. Stefan Daniel is the only Canadian triathlete to have secured a spot at the Games, representing Canada as a paratriathlete in the P4 category.