UIPM 2026 Pentathlon World Cup Cairo: Golden Guzi (HUN) opens season in style with Women’s Final success
Blanka Guzi of Hungary upstaged her Olympic champion team-mate to win the opening gold medal of the season, coming from behind to win the Women’s Final at UIPM 2026 Pentathlon World Cup Cairo.
Guzi (HUN) adapted best to the new Pentathlon format to take her gold-medal collection to three following success in Budapest (HUN) in 2023 and Sofia (BUL) in 2024. The sport now features a shorter 100m swim and an additional shoot in Laser Run, where Guzi (HUN) set a new world record of 10min 54.93sec as well as a new overall high of 1,488 points.
It was a true test of early-season stamina in the Cairo heat and Guzi (HUN) timed her Laser Run brilliantly, having started 27sec behind leader Viyaleta Hureyeva (AIN), who ended up claiming the bronze medal behind fellow neutral athlete Anastasiya Malashenoka (AIN). That was a reverse of last year’s event where the duo stood on the podium in the opposite order.
Shooting was the key to their success and ultimately separated them from pre-race favourites, Paris 2024 Olympic champion Michelle Gulyas (HUN) and Ilke Ozyuksel of Türkiye, who finished 5th and 6th respectively. Anna Jurt of Switzerland powered home to an impressive 4th place, with Rita Erdos (HUN) in 7th and Ganah Elgindy of Egypt leading the home contingent in 8th.
The Men’s Final follows at 15:00 today (Central European Summer Time).
Fencing
An improvement in Fencing has been a feature of the journey taken by Ozyuksel (TUR) from competitor to contender. Now a podium regular, she dominated the Seeding Round in this season-opener and made her way through the rounds of Direct Elimination, blocking Jana Attia (EGY) from a home Final with a 4-3.
On the other side of the draw, Gulyas (HUN) lived up to her status as Olympic champion with two comfortable victories on the way to the Top 4, where she met the immovable object of Hureyeva (AIN). She struck first and then defended well to eliminate Gulyas (HUN) 4-2 and set up a decider against Ozyuksel (TUR).
The Final was a thriller, two fencers matching each other blow for blow, until a decisive fleche by Hureyeva (AIN) secured the maximum 250 points, with Ozyuksel (TUR) taking 244 points forward and Gulyas (HUN) 238.
Obstacle
A high standard was evident throughout the nine heats, with Poppy Clark of Great Britain and Guzi (HUN) going sub-35sec to set the early standard. Then Zeina Amer (EGY) stepped forward to step it up: a supreme performance to stop the clock in 30.8sec.
Katharina Jurt (SUI), having lost in Fencing to her elder sister Anna, showed her Obstacle prowess with a brilliant 31.76 that took her top of the overall standings prior to the last two heats. Chloe Johnson (GBR) was the only athlete to incur a yellow flag as she took one risk too many on the Flying Hoops and dropped to the mat.
The last two heats were closely matched, with Gulyas (HUN) and Attia (EGY) both going sub-34 and Ozyuksel (TUR) and Hureyeva (AIN) sub-36, creating a top four separated by just eight points overall.
Swimming
A slick swim by Guzi (HUN) in Heat 2 (1:02.13) led to a significant leaderboard gain, no doubt injecting fear into rivals who know her Laser Run brilliance. Her time was bettered only by Malashenoka (AIN, 1:01.76), though Salma Abdelmaksoud (EGY) also swam sub-1:03 to be in the top 10.
The final heat was about consolidation: Hureyeva (AIN) won it in 1:04 to inch further ahead, though Ozyuksel (TUR) and Gulyas (HUN) refused to yield much ground.
Laser Run
Starting Laser Run only 10sec ahead of Ozyuksel (TUR) and 12sec ahead of Gulyas (HUN) would be enough to leave many athletes in a cold sweat but Hureyeva (AIN) handled the pressure well throughout the race. She only had one sticky shoot and that was enough to encourage Malashenoka (AIN), whose accuracy was extraordinary as she gobbled up a starting deficit of 32sec to enter the podium conversation.
Prior to that, Gulyas (HUN) had seemed in prime position to challenge the leader, but a 15sec shoot at the fourth visit to the range was damaging as she slipped suddenly from 2nd to 4th, knowing that her team-mate Guzi (HUN) was now galloping away with the two neutral athletes who consigned her to 4th place here last year.
Gulyas (HUN) and Jurt (SUI) now jostled for 4th, a rare poor performance with the pistol having ended the hopes of Ozyuksel (TUR). But if the neutral duo had aspirations of gold, they were blown away by the relentless running of Guzi (HUN), who accelerated away on the final 600m to set the tone for what promises to be an intriguing season, with world champion Farida Khalil (EGY) expected to return later in spring.
Watch and follow
UIPM 2026 Pentathlon World Cup Cairo takes place from April 8-12, with live stream of the Semi-finals and Finals available free on UIPM’s YouTube streaming service.
Finals schedule with stream start times (Central European Summer Time):
- Sunday April 12: Men’s Final (15:00).
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