The swim consists of two 750-metre laps, starting on a pontoon in Odaiba Marine Park and heading into Tokyo Bay towards Bird Island. Scaled down from traditional triathlon lengths to make the sport more fan-friendly, the race will feature a 1.5km swim, a 40km bike ride, followed by a 10km run. Most elite men will finish the race in well under two hours.

Coggins, who is ranked 47th in the world, said he is expecting to be on turbocharge from the sound of the gun.

“Everyone is going to be pushing really hard right from the start, so it’s not a race where you can go in conservatively at all. If you go in with the mindset of trying to be conservative at the start, you’re just going to get run out of the water.”

Hong Kong’s Oscar Coggins qualifies for Tokyo Olympics

After the swim, racers will head to Seaside Park onto a “technical” bike course, said Coggins, which consists of eight laps with the Tokyo skyline as the backdrop.

Coggins, who is known for being a strong swimmer which usually puts him at the front of the pack coming out of the water, said the idea is to use his assets to his advantage.

“I’m coming into this race with a swim-bike focus. It’s a very technical course, which means being in a bigger group doesn’t necessarily mean faster despite the drafting on the bike.

“Every time you go around a corner you have to spread out and it accordions back and forth, so it’s really important to get in a good pack. I’ve been running well, unfortunately I haven’t been able to share that in races but I have been running as fast as I ever have, and given the heat.”

During the test event for the race earlier this year, Tokyo was suffering through a heatwave, which forced organisers to scale back the women’s race by five kilometres. Coggins is expecting more of the same in July.

Tokyo Olympic Committee organisers and the International Olympic Committee have introduced a number of measures to try to deal with what could be record-breaking temperatures and high humidity. For Coggins and his fellow competitors, this means an early start time to try to complete the course before the temperature gets too high.

Coggins said he is not too fussed about the climate challenges.

“Training in Hong Kong, that’s not something I’m worried about when it comes to acclimatising. If anything, that works in my favour. I think I’m pretty comfortable with how hot the course will be.”

He also has the experience of running two races already in Japan this year – the 2021 Asia Triathlon Championships in Hatsukaichi in April, where he came fourth, and the 2021 World Triathlon Championship Series in Yokohama in May, where he came 37th and clocked in at 01:47:50.

His coach, Andrew Wright, said although Coggins is relatively young, he’s got the mindset of a veteran and all the tools to be one of the best triathletes in the world.

“Oscar is the most hard working, dedicated and passionate athlete I have come across,” said Wright, who has coached Coggins for eight years. “Blended with a high degree of intelligence and a killer instinct, these traits depict the character necessary to compete at elite level.”

Coggins and Wright will fly into Tokyo on July 22 and head back home the day after the race, a shortened time frame because of Covid-19 restrictions that will be in place for the Games.

Now that he has officially qualified, Coggins will become the second Hongkonger to take part in the Olympic event after Daniel Lee Chi-wo, who competed at Beijing 2008 and came 43rd.

Coggins said after all the preparation, training, and having the Olympics already postponed for a year, he is more than ready to just get out there and compete.

“Nothing is getting in the way now, whether it be Covid or qualifying. It’s in the bag now and I’m just really looking forward to heading to Tokyo and racing.”