Back-to-back Olympic golds the target for triathlete Kristian Blummenfelt
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Kristian Blummenfelt in action during the PTO European Open 2023 in May.
PHOTO: PROFESSIONAL TRIATHLETES ORGANISATION
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SINGAPORE – In the ultra-competitive world of triathlon, the Brownlee brothers Alistair and Jonathan are the sport’s biggest names, with Alistair making history at the Rio Olympics in 2016, when he became the first to win back-to-back golds.
Fans may soon be talking about Kristian Blummenfelt instead, as the Norwegian – who claimed gold at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics – attempts to become just the second triathlete to achieve the feat at the Paris 2024 Games.
Speaking to The Straits Times from Font Romeu’s National Altitude Training Centre in France, he said: “I am equally as motivated (for Paris). I feel like I don’t have the same (pressure). In Tokyo, I was on a 10-year programme going into that race and I felt like I had a knife at my throat where I had to perform there.
“And then that was my chance and now I feel like I have a second chance in Paris.
“The feeling I had winning in Tokyo was great, but it’d be even better at a normal Olympic Games with spectators because that’s always something that’s driving us as athletes – a lot of people with the great atmosphere.”
Blummenfelt, 29, who will compete at the Aug 19-20 Professional Triathletes Organisation (PTO) Asian Open
In August 2021, he became the first man to win the Olympic gold and world title in the same year after finishing first at the World Triathlon Championship in Edmonton, Canada.
A year later, he was the first to complete a sub-seven-hour Ironman-distance triathlon after clocking 6hr 44min and 25sec.
And he does not plan to stop as he hunts for an elusive PTO title.
Launched in 2022, the PTO’s 2023 season consists of races in Europe, the United States and Asia, with the European leg held recently in Ibiza, Spain.
Blummenfelt finished second in Edmonton and Ibiza in July 2022 and May respectively.
The Singapore leg in the Marina Bay area will be the first PTO Tour event in Asia. It will feature a men’s and women’s 100km race comprising a 2km swim, 80km bike ride and 18km run, and two duathlon races.
The Music Run, last held in Singapore in 2018, will also be staged alongside the PTO races.
Blummenfelt said: “I want to be able to dial in and prove that I can win on the biggest stage on the PTO.
“I’ve only had two second places so far, so I do want to win the PTO open races and also I want to show that I can go from short course and up to Ironman distances and back to short courses again.
“That is what I’ve been striving for. I feel I’m in the right direction and I am excited (about) coming to Singapore for the very first time.”
His trip to Singapore will be a whirlwind 48-hour stop as he will be competing in three events across two continents in 10 days.
The first is an Olympic test event in Paris on Aug 18, followed by the PTO Asian Open in Singapore two days later, before heading to the Ironman 70.3 World Championships in Lahti, Finland, on Aug 27.
A man clearly in a hurry – on and off the competition course – Blummenfelt has already set his sights on where to spend his leisure time here.
Not surprisingly, it is somewhere in Singapore waters – albeit 200 metres up in the air at the Marina Bay Sands’ infinity pool.
