But hidden deeper in the small print for the Tokyo Games is a reason to turn those frowns upside down.

And in Tasmania in particular.

Among many tweaks to existing sport formats is the introduction of a mixed team relay to the triathlon.

It could be argued that the world’s best mixed team relay competitor is Riverside’s Jake Birtwhistle.

In fact it will be, right here, please read on. 

Since choosing to focus purely on triathlon at the age of 17 instead of an equally bright future in middle-distance running, Birtwhistle has established himself among the world’s best in the individual discipline.

In 2013 he became Australian and Oceania junior champion and the following year he retained his national title and became the duathlon world junior champion and triathlon world junior silver medallist.

In 2015 he became the under-23 world champion – at the age of 20 – and began adding national and continental open titles.

Since then World Triathlon Series and Super League Triathlon podiums have flowed along with a Commonwealth Games silver medal as the former Riverside Primary and High School product, who still spends his off-season doing laps of Riverside Swimming Pool, locked horns with the world’s best at such exotic locations as Hamburg, Edmonton, Abu Dhabi, Hamilton Island, Yokohama and even Devonport.

In the process, Birtwhistle played a pivotal role in the emergence of the fledgling discipline of team relay triathlon.

A year after helping Australia to a silver medal at the 2016 world championships, Birtwhistle was in the team that returned to Hamburg to claim gold.

This year he led his country to victory at both the Commonwealth Games in April and the WTS event in Edmonton at the weekend.

Birtwhistle is invariably deployed as the team anchorman to take full advantage of his phenomenal running speed.

An 11-time Australian middle-distance champion, in 2012 he was a world schools cross-country champion and also ran the second fastest 5000m (14:19) ever by an under-18 Australian.

Had he not chosen to specialise in triathlon, Birtwhistle could now be challenging his contemporary, former Tasmanian cross-country championship rival and Commonwealth Games teammate Stewart McSweyn’s monopoly on the state’s middle distance records.

This finishing speed is what makes Birtwhistle so dangerous in the relays. Provided they can deliver him in the mix heading into the final discipline, his teammates know there are few other elite triathletes that can match his run.

Never was this better demonstrated than in Edmonton on Sunday when the smiling assassin picked off his rivals one by one.

Images of Birtwhistle sprinting across finish lines into the arms of grateful teammates like Ashleigh Gentle, Charlotte McShane, Matt Hauser, Luke Willian, Gillian Backhouse, Aaron Royle and Natalie Van Coevorden have virtually become the default setting of Australian triathlon websites.

And having helped Australia add the Commonwealth crown to its world title, the 23-year-old can't wait to see the event make its Olympic debut in Japan.

“It's going to be an amazing Olympic event,” he said after the Gold Coast triumph.

“I think everyone has really stepped up since it was made an Olympic event in 2020 in Tokyo.

“We Australians won the world champs last year and now we've shown once again that we are the best mixed team relay team in the world so we're in a great position and there's plenty of athletes that could take us to victory again in 2020.

“Being 23 I'm still quite young and Luke (Willian) and Matt (Hauser) are even younger so it puts not only myself but the country in a great position to be a triathlon force moving forward. We're just coming into our peak.”

Launceston-born Birtwhistle is also continuing a proud Tasmanian tradition in triathlon.

Ulverstone’s Craig Walton was a world championship bronze medallist and in the Australian team when the sport made its Olympic debut in 2000 while Launceston’s Joe Gambles and Hobart’s Cameron Wurf have firmly established themselves among the sport’s formidable longer distances.

The 2020 relay format will see each athlete swim 300m, cycle 8km and run 2km – a drop in the Pacific Ocean compared to what Gambles and Wurf take on.

But having controversially missed selection to the Rio Olympics when he was Australia's top-ranked individual triathlete, Birtwhistle could be heading to Tokyo as the world’s best exponent of the team relay.

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