Eric Noël | The Quebecer, master of the Olympic triathlon

(Paris) The water of the Seine flows at a good rate under the Pont Alexandre-III. It is green that day, a shade a little less dark than that of the Saint-Laurent River. Depending on the moods of the Marne, its main tributary, it sometimes turns café au lait.

The Bateaux Mouches are docked. Only police shuttles crisscross this sensitive area. Downstream, just past the Pont des Invalides, floating skateboard ramps have appeared, revealing a rare secret of Friday night’s opening ceremony.

“Would you swim in the Seine?”

— If the water quality is good, well yes! There, the water quality is good, so… »

The question was theoretical. As head of technical and sports operations for the triathlon at the Paris Olympics, Eric Noël has a thousand other things to do than dip his feet in the Seine five days before the first familiarization session for the athletes. One of them is to make sure that the iconic blue carpet in the transition zone, which takes up almost the entire deck of the historic bridge, is compliant.

Still, his answer was sincere: “I’m not a very, very good swimmer, though. I might hang on to the dock, just to be safe. Or I might wear a life jacket.”

Eric Noël is more of a cyclist, and especially a runner, having founded the Pelicans de Rosemont running club in 2010. Two years later, this electrodynamics graduate was hired as technical director of Triathlon Québec, a position he held until the pandemic in 2020. In the meantime, this jack-of-all-trades—he took his firefighter course and co-founded the defunct hyperlocal news site ruemasson.com—has become an international triathlon official.

In 2021, in the midst of the COVID-19 crisis, the man who grew up in Saint-Marc-sur-Richelieu served as race director for the Triathlon international de Montréal, a stop on the World Series circuit. He played the same role for the World Sprint and Relay Championships held in the Old Port and Old Montreal the following year.

On the first day of the competition, the swimming segments of the events had to be cancelled due to heavy rains that had fallen during the week. The opening of valves to prevent flooding posed a risk to the quality of the river water. The junior races and qualifications were therefore transformed into duathlons (run-bike-run), a relatively common practice in triathlon to preserve the health of the athletes.

“Ultimately, the tests were good, we could have swum, but we acted as a precaution,” says Eric Noël. World Triathlon [la fédération internationale] has the same approach in Paris. If there is any doubt, there will just be no swimming.”

As in the Olympic and Paralympic test event in August 2023, when poor water quality in the Seine forced the cancellation of the swimming portion for the Paralympic races and the mixed relay. At the time, major works had not yet been completed around the Seine and the Marne, including the immense Austerlitz retention basin (50,000 m^⁠3the equivalent of 20 Olympic swimming pools), which only came into operation last month.

“The World Triathlon standards are extremely strict,” says the man who had been hired eight months earlier by the international federation. “In fact, they are harder to meet than the standard swimming standards.”

Eight contingency plans

Since the beginning of the month, two tests have been carried out every day in the Seine to measure the proportion of fecal coliforms. “I don’t have the precise data because we are not the ones carrying out the tests, but the vast majority of days, we were good [pour nager]. »

A committee will meet in the middle of the night before the three events on the program (men this Tuesday, women this Wednesday and mixed relay on August 5). In addition to the most recent measurement of the presence of bacteria E. coliother factors are taken into consideration, such as temperature, weather, winds, trends, current strength, etc.

Depending on these parameters, the start will be given (or not) at 8 a.m., a strategically early time to reduce the risk of extreme heat and increase the chances of better air quality.

Eight “contingency plans” have been established in case of problems. Thus, the men’s and women’s triathlons could be resumed on August 2, in the traditional format (1500 m swimming, 40 km cycling and 10 km running), shorter or in duathlon. The same goes for the mixed relay, postponed to the next day if conditions allow.

Have the world’s media made too much of the quality of the Seine’s water?

“I think so,” replies Eric Noël. “It’s the same for all triathlons: if the water quality is good, we swim, if not, we don’t swim. Everyone focuses on the Seine, but last year, the water was good almost every day of the year. For me, it’s not an issue. We just want to apply the rule in force and we hope that everything goes well.”

Technical challenges

Beyond this watery debate, the technical operations manager (its official title in France!) is enthusiastic about the complexity of organizing a triathlon of this scale in a city like Paris, which never holds one.

The complete closure of the Seine, from 2 a.m. to 11 a.m., is one, as is the installation of a removable departure pontoon that runs the entire width of the famous river.

The relative narrowness of the Alexandre-III bridge, which will also host the start and finish of the time trial on Saturday morning, forces some logistical acrobatics in the flow of movement around the transition zone. The bridge that connects the VII^e and VIII^e arrondissements forms a half-arch without central pillars, which limits the weight it can support, a constraint that Noël and his team had to take into account.

After passing between the Grand and Petit Palais, the participants will venture onto the cobblestones of the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, a surface that triathletes are not used to, unlike cyclists in the final stage of the Tour de France. Noël managed to have the blocks removed and asphalt a 25-metre section in the U-turn. “We don’t want to have 30 athletes fall on the bend because it’s raining or it’s slippery.”

At the request of the athletes, who wanted to preserve their ankles and legs for the relay, a portion of the running course on the famous artery was removed to be added on the other bank of the Seine.

The arrival photos will be memorable: whoever crosses the traditional victory ribbon will have the large golden dome of the Hôtel des Invalides in the background.

“We have to deliver the goods, we have no choice,” Eric Noël observed as he walked through what was still a vast construction site Tuesday afternoon. In the shadow of the majestic Grand Palais, recently restored to serve as a stage for fencing and taekwondo competitions, forklifts continued their work in the dust.

“I’m a little stressed, but it’s good stress, as athletes would say.”

Can Charles Paquet cause a surprise?

Charles Paquet, one of the two Quebec triathletes in Paris with Emy Legault, had already emerged on the provincial scene when Eric Noël took over as technical director of Triathlon Québec. He remembers races in Drummondville where the teenager would arrive with his coach Christian Lepage from his native Port-Cartier.

“He really had potential,” said the head of technical and sports operations for the triathlon at the Paris Olympics. “Over the past year, he has reached another level, especially in running.”

Ranked 19^e The 27-year-old, who is ranked fourth in the world based on his results over the past two years, sits fourth on the World Series circuit this year after finishing a career-high fifth in Yokohama and seventh in Cagliari in May.

Can he surprise in Paris? “Everything is possible,” Noël cautiously advances. He is fit like never before and in a competition like this, we don’t know what can happen.”

Veteran Tyler Mislawchuk, 15^e in Rio and Tokyo (despite an injury in Japan), is the other Canadian in the running. The 29-year-old Manitoban knows how to stand out on big occasions. Since Legault is the only Canadian qualified, the country will not be able to start the mixed relay.