2021 IRONMAN World Champion Kristian Blummentfelt has described the prospect of an all-Norwegian podium at this September’s full-distance showpiece in Nice as the Hype Train’s “wet dream” following his latest success at 70.3 Aix-en-Provence!
The 31-year-old took the tape in the French race at the weekend in a time of 3:41:08 – 31 seconds ahead of stablemate Casper Stornes who went toe-to-toe with his compatriot – with Big Blu’s transitions, where he gained 33 seconds, the difference.
The former Olympic champion spoke to the Norwegian Method Podcast in the aftermath of the race to discuss his group’s performances on the day, and the plans for the remainder of the season
1-2-3 dream
Blummenfelt, Stornes and 2022 IRONMAN World Champion Gustav Iden make up the “Norwegian Hype Train”, with the stable claiming two race victories – both to Blummenfelt – and two podiums – one each for Iden and Stornes – so far in 2025.
“That’s our wet dream for Nice, to get a 1-2-3,” Blummenfelt said, “but the thing we haven’t agreed on yet is what sort of order we should finish in. I reckon we should go by age, Casper agreed, but he wants it in reverse order.”
“We know each other on the race course – we know each other’s weaknesses and strengths – they know how they should race to beat me and I know what to do to beat them, so now it’s more about who is the strongest on the day.”
Big Blu was quick to praise his youngest teammate, who earned IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship qualification in France last weekend.
“It’s nice now that Casper has qualified for both Nice [IRONMAN World Championships] and Marbella [IRONMAN 70.3 World Championships]. He had an awful day at Oceanside where he was unable to qualify for Marbella, so to be able to tick those two off was great.”
It was a tougher day for Iden, who struggled across all three facets in Aix-en-Provence, finishing in a time of 3:50:59 – almost 10 minute behind Blummenfelt and Stornes. However, Big Blu insists all three gain a morale boost when the others do well.
“It gives confidence to the group and gives us the morale high, like Gustav had a tough day at Aix-en-Provence, but in general the group is performing well. Hopefully we can perform all together at the same race – but as of now, if someone is performing here or there, it’s great.”
Things to improve and travel plans
Blummenfelt discussed his own performance at Aix-en-Provence in depth on the podcast, which is embedded below. Following wins in Texas, and now France, Big Blu is in the process of fine tuning his race plans, rather than making wholesale changes to his approach.
“I was pleased to get the result, but I haven’t got any new ideas straight away from the race. It’ll be more about practicing the small things like learning about the bike dynamics using RaceRanger.
“Same with the swim, the more time I spend swimming with 70 guys and positioning myself in the water the better prepared I’ll be.”
“In general, it’s just improving those small skills within the race.”
He did admit, however, that sometimes a poor performance can be the catalyst to making vast improvements going forward.
“The great thing when you are having an awful day, it ignites your mind, thinking about 15 different things you need to do before the next race, whereas when you’re performing well it’s about trusting the process and about getting the small things right.”
The podcast concluded with the group’s travel plans going forward, with a pre-planned altitude block now unlikely to happen before IRONMAN Frankfurt – but it’s crystal clear just how much of a priority the IMWC in Nice is for this season.
“We did plan to go to Font-Romeu, but I think we are skipping that camp now – we are staying in Bergen until Frankfurt and then doing a five week camp going into Nice – we’ll essentially have two months in France going into Nice.”
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