Introducing Parcours Athlete Hanne de Vet
Hanne de Vet is a Belgium triathlete moving up to the middle distance, having raced of the short course, and World Triathlon circuit. She’s also studying and training to be a physiotherapist, balancing placements and exams, along with triathlon training and racing. She thrives on ensuring she keeps the fun in her racing, yet at the same time is prepared to push her comfort zone and take on courses that aren’t suited necessarily to her strengths and has a sensible and practical head on her, perhaps one beyond her years.
She’s recently changed coaches, and is now coached by her partner, New Zealand Triathlete Hayden Wilde. In her first season racing the middle distance, Hanne finished 15th at the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships. She has a bright future ahead of her, and I feel with her energy and outlook… a happy athlete is a fast athlete.
Currently in Belgium, Hanne splits her time between her home in Belgium, her home in Andorra with partner Wilde, and then in New Zealand, at Wilde’s home.
As Hanne heads into her first race of the season this weekend at Challenge Family, The Championship, Samorin, we caught up with the Parcours athlete to find out a little more about her.
Let’s meet Hanne de Vet.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------
Name: Hanne de Vet
From: Belgium
Live: Belgium, Andorra, New Zealand
Discipline: Triathlon, middle distance
Bike: Canyon Speedmax
Fav bit of kit (her Parcours wheels obvs!): Living in a Winter place, a good pair of long tights is important. I love Wynn. For an Australian brand they actually have really good long tights.
Who inspires you: Marek Hedmans. He was my coach when I was younger. He was a very good long distance athlete then unfortunately crashed on a training day and was paralyzed. He then got back into the sport and won Kona in his wheelchair. I learnt a lot from him, when I just started triathlon. You never give up and you just keep on going, no matter what.
From an athlete perspective, Taylor Knibb and Kat Matthews. I like the way they race because that’s how I want to race as well, but I’m not as strong as them...yet! (We love this!)
Coffee: Latte – although sometimes this gets me into trouble because not everywhere has a latte with the same amount of milk. Sometimes I get the soup bowls and I’m not a fan of those.
Fav café: Kofi, Andorra. It’s owned by a nice couple. It’s super relaxed and they’re always super nice when we get in.
Early Beginnings
Hanne grew up swimming. She was an active kid with a lot of energy to burn, and so swam five times a week with a local swimming club and also went twice a week to a local athletics club. Then on the weekends, Hanne would go with her Dad on a mountain bike. So, whilst she didn’t put the sports together, she grew up with all the elements.
“They are both older and all three of us were very competitive. So from a young age, we all swam, we all ran and we always competed against each other.”
Being the youngest of three, Hanne developed her competitive nature against her siblings, swimming and running against each other, yet would all come together to make a relay once a year, in a local triathlon. As she grew older, she was able to complete the triathlon herself. At the same time her swimming career was nearing its end. As a smaller athlete, her swimming competitors were growing faster, meaning she had to find her own strengths and how she could best compete against the bigger girls. She was coming to a cross roads in her education and what to study.
But getting Talent ID by the Belgium Triathlon Federation, she made her choice to head into triathlon, and the development system.
Olympic Dreams to Mastering the middle distance
Growing up Hanne had always seen herself as becoming a professional athlete and one day competing at the Olympic. Originally though, that was through swimming. Even though her coach had identified her strengths would probably excel over the longer distance of triathlon, having been brought into the Talent Development Programme, the Olympics was the dream again. The now 26year old appreciates she was probably a little young and early in her career and development for the Tokyo Olympics but felt she was in a good position to have a shot at Paris. However, as we often see with Governing bodies, and the politics that goes into policies and selections, Hanne was told that she wouldn’t be selected, even before the Olympic qualification process hadn’t yet closed. Whilst upsetting and frustrating when one door closes another opens and it was an opportunity for Hanne to try the longer distance.
As an athlete Hanne describes herself as liking to have fun.
“I mean I am competitive, but I still really like to have fun. I prefer to race well when I had fun during the race, rather than racing well but finding it was actually very boring. So sometimes it’s in my favour and sometimes it’s not. I think I just like to race hard and that makes me have fun.”
Whilst she feels she’s suited to rolling courses, where she can race hard she also likes to challenge herself and her abilities and the opportunity to learn and develop.
“The Challenge Championships might be quite a challenge for me because it’s a bit of a different kind of course, and quite straight forward, flat and boring. But that’s also why I want to challenge myself.”
A course that appeals more naturally to Hanne’s strengths is IRONMAN 70.3 Zell-am-See. She raced this in 2024, but off the back of supporting her partner Hayden Wilde, at the Paris Olympics, so wasn’t fully prepared, but is excited to race it in 2025.
Hanne will start her season at The Championship, Challenge Family’s flagship championship race. She’s hoping to get a Wild Card for T100 in June, but will then race the IRONMAN Pro Series races, IRONMAN 70.3 Swansea and IRONMAN 70.3 Zell-Am-See, before returning to race at home at IRONMAN 70.3 Knokke-Heist.
“It will be pretty cool, to race in my own country again, we don’t get to do that very often”
Hanne has already qualified for the IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships, in Marbella, Spain in December this year, so will look to race another race before the Worlds.
Whilst new to the middle distance, but coming from her competitive background both as a kid and in the WTS circuit, Hanne is keen to race the best in the world and so will look for races that give her that opportunity.
“It’s nice to get a podium on a 70.3 somewhere, but it’s nicer to race against the best in the world and maybe come in 10th.”
Balancing study, life, training and racing
Hanne is in the last few months of studying to be a physio and then hopefully will be qualified. Whilst she claims she probably hasn’t been balancing studying very well… her physio course normally takes five years to complete, and it will be nine for Hanne. But to balance internships, and class room time, along with triathlon training and racing, along with coordinating schedules with a partner who is also a world class athlete, we think is pretty impressive.
“If I look back, I might have split it up a little differently, and maybe finished in seven years. But it is what it is now, and I have been able to see a lot of the world.”
Having that ability to switch off away from the sport is something Hanne refers to several times. With the help of her coach, she’s been able to manage training around her studies, but with also preventing her from getting too fatigued as well. Then at the weekends, she tries to use that time to catch up with friends and family.
“I think your social life is still important as well. I’m trying my best but I guess sometimes it’s still not enough for me as a family.”
Hanne who is preparing for The Challenge Championship, as she finishes some of her physio studies, recently dropped everything and flew out to Tokyo to be with her partner, who had had a bike crash and was in hospital with several broken bones. Visiting her partner, and still squeezing in some turbo sessions, before flying back.
Whilst she’s not entirely sure what she’ll do going forward, as she’s keen to give her triathlon career a proper shot. She’s also aware that sometimes having something else to do can keep your mind busy and compartmentalise from training.
“I’m still debating about it because I do really want to give my triathlon career a proper shot. But then sometimes it’s also nice to be doing something else for a little bit on the side, just to keep your mind off. So maybe it’s that during winter period when I could go into a practice for two days or something.”
Another balance is trying to match racing schedules with Wilde.
“We thought our races would align a little bit more this year, as he was moving into middle distance. But then he got a T100 contract, and I don’t have one, so it’s not aligning at all.”
Whilst Hanne and Hayden can be apart for weeks with training and racing, they also of course try to spend as much time together as they can, and if schedules permit will go to each others races to support.
“We don’t’ see each other for two or three weeks, but I guess that the sport as well. And that’s how you support each other. We both have our different goals. So I support him with his goals and he supports me with mine.”
Support can come in other forms too, as Hayden now coaches Hanne. Both athletes were previously coached by Craig Kirkwood, but actually both decided separately that they wanted a change in their training programme. As Hanne was busy at the start of the year with her studies, it was going to be hard to start with a new coach, so Hayden decided to start coaching her.
“So far, so good. We had a few arguments at the start. We’ve been together for six years now, so we know each other pretty well. And at the end of the day, if it’s not working with the coaching, I just need to be honest and he needs to be honest, and then I find myself a new coach next year. But so far it’s actually going really well.”
We are excited to have Hanne on the Parcours team, and support her in her racing and training.
