Blummenfelt and Iden Make Surprise Appearance at Age-Group Ironman 70.3 in Taiwan
What was supposed to be an age-group race in southern Taiwan turned into quite the race when two of triathlon’s biggest names appeared on the start line.
Mel Sauve
Ironman 70.3 Kenting…an age-group race in southern Taiwan. We did not have our radar on this one, until out and about this Saturday afternoon when the tracker notification dinged on the watch, “Kristian Blummenfelt is out of the swim!”
Followed by none other than Gustav Iden.
I had to pull over the car. What was going on?!
Well, it looks like these two are undertaking a series of races on that side of the world, first in Taiwan and next in China (at Challenge Xiamen, as we previewed earlier this week).
As for this current race, what a treat for their Taiwanese fans. And perhaps we should have seen it coming, as Blummenfelt had posted himself receiving his own Puyan Shunze Temple “lucky hat” alongside Iden on Instagram earlier this week.
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And, the Ironman Taiwan Instagram teased their presence as well…although it had still managed to escape our eye!
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As for the race itself, Iden was wearing bib 6666 while Blummenfelt was wearing bib 8888. (Talk about the most competitive age-group race of all time!) Both 6 and 8 are considered lucky in Taiwan, with 6 associated with things going smoothly, and 8 associated with wealth and prosperity.
In terms of how the race unfolded, Blummenfelt came out of the swim first in a time of 25:43, followed by Iden 10 seconds behind. Blummenfelt then arrived in T2 4:36 ahead of Iden, and went on to claim the win, of course setting a new course record along the way in a time of 3:59:06.