‘The Norwegian Method’ has been the talk of triathlon for the past four years and more with Kristian Blummenfelt and Gustav Iden carrying all before them in elite competition.
In 2021 Blummenfelt really became a global star by claiming Olympic triathlon gold in Tokyo, and has since claimed IRONMAN World Championship glory, IRONMAN 70.3 World Championship glory and a host of other top prizes.
Iden meanwhile has also proved himself a true superstar by also winning the IRONMAN World Championship along with claiming a pair of 70.3 Worlds victories. Put simply they have hoovered up every prize that really matters in swim/bike/run.
This incredible run of success was founded not just on elite talent, but also through an obsessive focus on data. Masterminded by coach Olav Aleksander Bu, every possible metric was put under the microscope – from lactate levels to fecal samples.
In 2023 and 2024 things slowed though with the big prizes starting to dry up as Gustav was hit by injuries and personal tragedy, while Kristian’s bid to drop back down to Olympic distance resulted in failure at Paris 2024.
Blu and Iden at the crossroads?
Now it appears the pair are at something of a crossroads, with both set to concentrate on the IRONMAN Pro Series in 2025. Their big goal is the IRONMAN World Championship in Nice, and there is of course the small matter of a $200,000 bonus for whoever tops those Pro Series standings at the end of the year.
That relative famine in 2023 and 2024, following the feast of earlier years, has led some experts to question the long-term sustainability of ‘The Norwegian Method’, so we asked triathlon legend Mark Allen for his take.
The six-time IRONMAN World Champion is a huge fan of both Blummenfelt and Iden and has huge respect for their talent and way of racing. But he does not believe their training and testing is quite as revolutionary as some would have you believe.
He told TRI247: “Let me just say, if the Norwegian Method was flawless, we would have seen better results from Gustav and Kristian in the last couple of years.
“Some philosophies of coaching will get you super-fit but they won’t be sustainable. Other methods, they take much longer to manifest in terms of the positive effects, however they’re much more sustainable.
“Clearly the Norwegian Method, it seems like it was something that really catapulted these two guys to the very top of the sport, set a whole new standard for everybody, but wasn’t sustainable. Gustav getting injured, Kristian having moments of brilliance but clearly I don’t think hitting the same level of dominance that he had there for a while.”
Is ‘Norwegian Method’ revolutionary?
Allen has formed his own opinion on ‘The Norwegian Method’ over a number of years, admitting: “Years ago, when those guys first started winning every World Championship on the planet, starting with Tokyo and onward, I was like ‘oh my God, what are these guys doing, what is that Norwegian Method?’
“I saw a YouTube video and Gustav was kind of explaining what they’re doing. And I realise they’re not trying to solve any different problems than I had when I was racing. Okay we’re measuring how many calories they can take per hour before the stomach backs up, or measuring how their body temperature gets before performance falls off, or measuring how hard they can go before they blow up. All of the things that I was doing, it’s just that they can measure it.
“I had to do it by intuition, I had no way of measuring my body temperature to see what it was. I just knew ‘okay that if I get this hot, I’m toast. If I shove in more than this amount, I start to get sick. If I go harder than this sensation, or heart rate, I can’t sustain it’.
“So what took me basically 15 years to evolve, they condensed into probably two years. What was revealed in that video a number of years ago, there was nothing new that they were looking at that we weren’t looking at in the 80s – it’s just that they could refine it quicker.
“But there’s also things that I was looking at, that maybe they’re not. Are you measuring adrenal stress? Are you measuring energetically where an athlete is at so they don’t burn out. There were a lot of things that I was doing that I’m not sure they’re measuring and so that’s where my sustainability came in and maybe some shortfalls in the Norwegian Method.
“Obviously, like I said, if it was ground-breaking and sustainable we would have seen a continuation of that dominance, but both of them have faltered a little bit.”
The future for Kristian and Gustav
Now of course the focus will be on how Kristian and Gustav bounce back in 2025, and whether their partnership with Bu will deliver more big-race gold. Some recent reports have even suggested that alliance could be about to end, apparently shot down by the boys from Bergen.
While Bu has a new job as head coach of Norwegian pro cycling team Uno-X, he told TRI247 recently that he will continue to oversee the careers of Blummenfelt and Iden. Allen believes continuing such a successful partnership is the right move.
He reasoned: “Are they gonna dump Olav? I don’t know, I would hate to see them go the Lionel Sanders route of ‘Oh, I’m not where I used to be so let me revamp everything’.
“It seems like they had such an intimate relationship, that triad of those two guys and that coach, that it would be hard to replace.”
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