The Race Brain Drop vol. 34

The third and final Regional event of the 2025/2026 season takes place this weekend in Brisbane, Australia.

Lineups are finalized, and we are only hours away from the start of the Individual races.

Singles kick off Friday evening, with the women starting at 7:30 PM local time and the men following at 9:00 PM local time. For those in the United States , that translates to 5:30 AM ET / 7:00 AM ET. The Doubles races will follow that same schedule on Saturday evening.

While the depth of field may not match what we just saw in London , this is still a region that consistently produces high-level athletes relative to its size and number of racing opportunities. At last year’s World Championships, athletes from Australia and New Zealand accounted for six top-10 Individual finishes across the men’s and women’s fields.

Clearly, APAC knows how to show up when the opportunity is there.

Here’s a quick look at the lineups for all four races in the order they’ll happen.

Women’s Individual

Notably absent is Joanna Wietrzyk, who appears to be fully focused on chasing a Major sweep and is already in Europe.

Jess Pettrow and Gabrielle Nikora-Baker have already punched their tickets to Stockholm , but they’ll still be racing for the title of APAC Champion.

Calypso Sheridan comes in as the likely favorite. She had a disappointing finish at the first Major of the season in Hamburg , but followed that up with a win in Melbourne and a near sub-60 performance in Taipei.

Mollie Fkiaras is an unknown as she owns one of the fastest seed times in the field but has also recently announced that she is 18 weeks pregnant.

Men’s Individual

In contrast to Joanna, James Kelly has chosen to pursue the APAC Regional title and will not be competing in Warsaw. He is the only man in the field who has already qualified.

Also absent are Tom Rodgers and Beau Wills, both of whom had to decline their invites due to injury.

After a 5th-place finish in Chicago, Jon Wynn has not finished higher than 10th in an Elite race this season. Still, against this field, he looks like the clear favorite to take the qualifying spot.

The athlete most likely to challenge him may be Dexter Buchanan, who recently clocked a 56:48 in Bangkok.

Women’s Doubles

Former World Record holders Jess Pettrow / Joanna Wietrzyk will not be racing.

One of the more interesting storylines here comes from Mollie Fkiaras and Meg Martin. After qualifying together in Melbourne, the pair went their separate ways and forfeited their spot. Now, they’ll be on opposite sides of the battle for both the championship and the qualifying position.

The teams of Fkiaras / Gabrielle Nikora-Baker and Martin / Calypso Sheridan look like the most likely contenders for the top of the podium.

Men’s Doubles

The team of James Kelly and Matt Slee owns the fastest seed time in the field at 50:50 and enters as the clear favorite.

However, there’s an important wrinkle here: James Kelly is set to race Worlds with Jake Dearden. So if Kelly and Slee win, that qualifying spot would roll down to the second-place team.

Dan Corinn and Kane Baigent have the next-fastest seed time at 52:24.

Dexter Buchanan and Chris Woolley come in with a slower listed time, but that mark was set on a very tough Auckland course. The same could be said for James Newbury and Dene Flude in Cancun. I’d expect all three of those teams to be firmly in contention.

The Australian fitness community always shows out, so this should be a fun weekend of racing.