Cam Wurf believes 2026 will be the year he challenges for the IRONMAN World Championship crown in Kona.
The popular Aussie star may be 42 now but he has an endurance CV like no other – starting out as an Olympic rower before becoming a pro cyclist who helped the INEOS Grenadiers win the iconic Paris-Roubaix for the first time in 2022.
Wurf famously ran a half marathon straight after as part of his triathlon training and there’s plenty of evidence that he goes into the 2026 campaign better than ever at swim, bike and run.
‘Did I still have it?’
And in a typically engaging chat with Bob Babbitt and the Triathlon Club of San Diego, which is embedded below, he talks about the moment last season when he got the fire back in his belly for what he could still achieve in triathlon.
Looking back to IRONMAN Texas last April, where he set a then world record bike split of 3:53:32, he explained: “In the previous years I’d started losing bike course records, I’d started losing time on the bike in races and I was starting to wonder did I still have it?
“But I’d done a lot of work in the wind tunnel and I was confident we’d find a lot of improvements which we did.
“Guys like Magnus Ditlev and Sam Laidlow had really pushed the boundaries with that and were on the cutting edge. But I felt I was able to then at least get back on a level playing field and then believe that I had the physical capacity to back it up with my legs.”
‘Remind the sport you still matter’
The night before Texas, Wurf was reading a book called ‘So Good They Can’t Ignore You’ by Cal Newport which gave him added motivation, explaining: “I struggled halfway through the swim and got dropped back to that second or third group that I’m normally in.
“But we were only two-and-a-half, three minutes behind but then early on the bike the gap went out to six minutes on Kristian [Blummenfelt] and the guys – and I just said to myself ‘this sport ain’t forgetting me’.
“And I just turned the corner and hit the throttle. I’d read that book and thought ‘just remind the sport that you still matter’.”
What happened next was he cut through the field and bridged up to Big Blu and co before saying “good luck catching me today buddy” as he powered past!
He added: “I just had that fire back and it felt so good.
“It was a fast course and it was one of the ‘first off the bike’ results I’d had in a few years against a world-class field so it was a very important moment.”
He would end up eighth after a 2:50 marathon but reckons there’s way more to come, explaining: “It sort of laid the foundations and this year I really want to go to Texas and not only have the world record on the bike [which has since been claimed by Kristian Høgenhaug thanks to a 3:52:10 at IRONMAN Frankfurt] but also I want to do the fastest time ever because I believe I can do that.”
That mark currently stands at 7:21:12 by Blummenfelt at IRONMAN Cozumel in 2021.
All-round improvement
While Wurf is famed for his bike prowess, his swim and run are also trending in the right direction and qualifying early for Kona this year thanks to his runner-up at IRONMAN Chattanooga last September has massively helped with that process.
He told Babbitt: “I knew it was really important this last year to qualify early if I wanted to give myself a real chance to win – or a chance to challenge [at Kona].
“It’s meant that we’ve been able to do things like a 5k running block recently. We’ve been able to go back to the pool and do speed work while still being able to hold my form. So that’s the first phase.
“And I’m [now] really confident that my swim can get me where I need to be in order to be competitive in Kona.
“Having that freedom these last few months has been imperative to lay those foundations.”
Wurf’s 2:50 marathon the last time the IRONMAN World Championship was held in Kona in 2024 saw him surge up the field into seventh, his third top 10 there despite then juggling triathlon with his pro cycling commitments, which isn’t the case now.
His run improvement has been a steady progression in recent years too. His last nine full-distance races have seen marathon splits between 2:44 and 2:53 every single time. And just this last weekend he clocked a half marathon PB of 1:14:33 at the Carlsbad Double Down Challenge in California, finishing in the top 10 from over 4,000 competitors – and first in his age category.
It all bodes well for the season ahead and there’s added confidence for Wurf which he gleaned from some training sessions he did with the all-conquering Norwegians ahead of the IMWC in Nice last year.
Watch the video below to hear more about that but Wurf has always been an athlete massively respected by his peers and it sounds like he might just be about to have his best triathlon season so far – at 42 years young.
