Norway’s Kristian Blummenfelt won the men’s triathlon Olympic gold medal in a race which started dramatically in Japan.

At the Odaiba Marine Park in Tokyo, the 27-year-old earned the first gold medal for Norway since the 2012 Olympics. After a 1500m swim and 40km on the bicycle, he had to dig deep in the last 2.5km (of 10km) run to beat stiff competition from youngsters, Alex Yee (GBR) and New Zealand’s Hayden Wilde.

Read Also: Melody Tan Set To Do Malaysia Proud Officiating At Tokyo Olympics 2020

Reaching into his pocket filled with experience, Blummenfelt finished in a time of 1 hour, 45 minutes and four seconds. The race started dramatically with false starts when a boat was found blocking half the starting field in the swim.

“I wanted a medal, obviously I preferred the gold medal, everything else I would have been disappointed with,” said Blummenfelt, ranked world number 2.

Meanwhile, UK’s double Olympian Jonathon Brownlee could only finish in fifth place, but will have another chance to redeem himself in the Mixed Relay race on July 30.

Read Also: Janatul “Jaii” Naim Aspires To Represent Malaysia in Multisports

Read Also: PASKAL Abdul Rahman Aces IRONMAN Triathlon Races Too

Other top favourites did not have a good day in the office, including world number 1 Mario Mola who finished tenth, world number 2 Vincent Luis finished 13th, former world champion Javier Gomez finished in 25th while top South African Henri Shoeman did not finish the race.

The Elite Women will race on 27th July at 5.30am, to be broadcasted on Astro and RTM. A new event – Mixed Relay will be raced on 31st July at 6:30am Malaysian time.

Read Also: Safa Learnt Swimming In 4 Months To Complete IRONMAN Langkawi

Results

1. NOR – BLUMMENFELT Kristian 1:45:04
2. GBR – YEE Alex 1:45:15
3. NZL – WILDE Hayden 1:45:24
4. BEL – van RIEL Marten 1:45:52
5. GBR – BROWNLEE Jonathan 1:45:53
6. USA – McDOWELL Kevin 1:45:54
7. HUN – BICSAK Bence 1:45:56
8. NOR – IDEN Gustav 1:46:00
9. SUI – STUDER Max 1:46:06
10. ESP – MOLA Mario 1:46:13

Source: Olympic.com | View Results