TAYLOR-BROWN Georgia

General
2020 WORLD CHAMPION
She said she initially struggled to accept her title as world champion in the shortened 2020 season, where a one-off World Triathlon Series race, the 2020 Hamburg Wasser in Germany, decided the world title. "I didn't accept that world champs title, because I thought it's not really world champs. It's strange and other countries can't be here and it was thrown on us last minute. But then after a few weeks I thought, to be honest, I earned it. I became a bit more proud of myself and realised what I'd achieved. It was [US triathlete] Katie Zaferes who said, 'You were the one who put your head down during lockdown and you beat everyone there and you obviously got the best training in. So you need to accept that you are world champ'." (tri247.co, 06 Sep 2020; tokyo2020.org, 12 Nov 2020)

MELEE OF MADNESS
In 2020 she said she does not enter races with a specific strategy in mind, but had been working on improving her speed in the opening moments of the swim. "So much can go wrong, and if I planned something and it didn't go my way, I think I would definitely panic. It [the swimming start] is just a massive pile-up. All sorts happen, people pull your legs, pull on your suit, grab your head. It's just awful - you don't know what's going to happen. Anyone could just appear and belt you in the face out of nowhere. I've been punched in the face before. I'm trying to up my speed so I can get closer to that first buoy quicker than everyone else, so I'm not part of that melee of madness." (tokyo2020.org, 12 Nov 2020)

MAJOR INJURIES THREATEN CAREER
The injuries and surgeries to her foot in 2014 and 2015 nearly ended her triathlon career. "They [doctors] even said to me, 'You might never run again', because of the seriousness of the injury and because I was osteopenic [low bone mass] and the fact that it doesn't have a good blood supply it's very, very hard to heal the bone. They did say, 'Look you're going to have to be prepared for the worst here'. Who knows, if I didn't get that injury I might have ended up just going too hard at such a young age and I wouldn't be doing triathlon now [2020]." (tokyo2020.org, 12 Nov 2020)

OLYMPIC QUALIFICATION DSQ
In August 2019 she and British teammate Jess Learmonth were disqualified from the 2019 Olympic Qualification Event in Tokyo, Japan, after crossing the finish line in first place together while holding hands. International Triathlon Union [ITU] rules state that athletes cannot intentionally finish in a tie. An appeal from the athletes was rejected. "Sucks for us, but it's just one race, we promise not to do that again." In late 2020 both athletes were still selected by British Triathlon to compete at the Olympic Games. (britishtriathlon.org, 04 Nov 2020; bbc.co.uk, 13 Mar 2020; runnersworld.com, 15 Aug 2019; Twitter profile, 15 Aug 2019)