The change has been foreced upon the ITU because Lausanne, the home of the International Olympic Committee (IOC), had to withdraw from the series due to insufficient funding.

The World Series will now arrive in Stockholm on the weekend of August 25 and 26, the sixth stage of the eight leg series and will include the ITU mixed relay World Championships.

It will be the first leg of the series following this summer's Olympic Games, for which the triathlon takes place on August 4 and 7 in Hyde Park, London.

Sydney is the venue for the start of the series on April 14, before it goes to San Diego, Madrid, Kitzbuhel and Hamburg.

After Stockholm, the series goes to Yokohama before finishing in Auckland from October 20 to 22.

The Stockholm leg will have $170,000 (£107,000/€128,000) on offer across the two races.

It will be the first time since 1997 that the city has hosted an ITU event.

Another change is that the Guatape World Cup in Colombia has been rearranged from July 1 to September 9.

The ITU has also announced that the first ever ITU World Cup events over a sprint distance will be in Edmonton, Canada on July 8, Tiszuajvaros, Hungary on July 14 and 15 and Cancun, Mexico on October 7.

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