Defending Olympic Champion Kristian Blummenfelt’s Road to Paris with FORM
As we near the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games on Friday, July 26, we will then be just three short days away from the triathlon events kicking off on July 30th, starting with the men’s individual race where we will see the world’s best duke it out for gold.
In 2021, at the Tokyo games, we saw an explosive Kristian Blummenfelt run away from Great Britain’s Alex Yee, who finished second, and New Zealand’s Hayden Wilde, third, to grasp gold for Norway.
In Tokyo, Kristian came out of the swim in a large chase pack in 27th position, caught the lead group on the bike towards the end of lap 3, and powerfully ran his way to blue carpet infamy. As he prepares to repeat his achievement in Tokyo, in Paris, he invited FORM behind the scenes.
Take a watch of Kristian’s Road to Paris series here 👇
Episode 1
Coming off a decent winter of training, in this first episode Kristian shares his thoughts on how he aims to add more intensity to his swim training as he gears up for his first race of the year in Abu Dhabi.
Since winning in Tokyo, and switching to middle and long-distance triathlon races post-Tokyo, Kristian knows that if he wants to win in Paris, he needs to improve both his swimming and running over the shorter Olympic distance.
Having swum the Paris test event last year, Kristian is aware that the downstream current for the first 400m of the swim in the Seine will lead to a fast start, and that the French athletes will be very motivated at their ‘home’ games.
Episode 2
With his first race of the season in Abu Dhabi cancelled due to extreme weather conditions and flooding, in this second episode Kristian is now back training at altitude in Sierra Nevada.
Focusing on the explosive nature of short-course triathlon racing, Kristian shares how he’s working on his take-out speed with the first 100, 200, and 300 meters of the swim in Paris being critical, while also looking at his overall race pace/energy expenditure over the duration of the 1500m swim.
Kristian and his team have analyzed the manipulation of speed duration curves for different triathlon race distances as well as where his swim technique drops off at certain intensity levels, all with the intention of ensuring he’s with the first group out of the water in Paris.
Episode 3
For this final installment of Kristian’s Road to Paris series, he’s back training in Bergen ahead of what will be his final altitude training block in Font Romeu. A couple of new areas of focus on the swim for Kristian are his head position, and his time to neutral, with his FORM goggles providing him with all the real-time feedback he needs to make necessary improvements.
His aim is to get out of the swim head of Alex Yee and Hayden Wilde in Paris, with his eyes firmly set on what he achieved in Tokyo. Also, will this be Kristian’s last Olympics…
All Eyes on Paris
At last year's test event, Great Britain’s Alex Yee took gold. A year on, we couldn’t be more excited to see how the racing will unfold.
The schedule for Triathlon events at the 2024 Olympics Games is as follows:
