Not as fast as Max last year……

Agree. If it’s a decent westerly it won’t help I don’t think.

I hate it when it’s written down. Absolutely crushing it at present - should smash course record

7h34m with 6 mins down to second is just amazing! The Danes are killing it! Well done Bækkegård!

great race from him. he's a likeable guy and it's nice to see him get a W after a good while of nearly making it. on a side note, i sometimes wonder why races like this aren't more popular - it's admittedly a hell of a lot of travel, even for people in australia/nz, but now daniel's taken some prize money, helped his ranking, and punched his ticket for kona very early. especially given the new calculus everyone will be doing about the IM series, this takes a LOT of pressure off his planning for next year.

other side note: chuffed for fenella! she put together a hell of a race.

---

____________________________________
https://lshtm.academia.edu/MikeCallaghan

http://howtobeswiss.blogspot.ch/

Daniel Bækkegård is a 26-year-old professional triathlete. 2019 was Daniel’s first year as a professional triathlete. Despite his young age and inexperience on the full distance he managed to take the sport by storm by winning his debut ironman at the legendary Ironman Austria- Kärnsten, earning his Ironman World Championship qualification as the youngest professional athlete.

Mulen wrote:

7h34m with 6 mins down to second is just amazing! The Danes are killing it! Well done Bækkegård!

.
.
Great race from both Daniel and Fenella both of whom raced Challenge Canberra last week. Daniel won and Fenella lost in a sprint finish by 9 seconds. A great turn around for both of them.
Daniel Bækkegård back on top at Challenge Canberra as Els Visser wins women's race - Elite News - TRI247
IRONMAN Western Australia 2023 Results: Daniel Bækkegård and Fenella Langridge win in Busselton - Elite News - TRI247
.
Fenella did her post Kona/pre Busso training block just up the road from me in Noosa and loved it. In this video she is outside of the Noosa Surf Life Saving Club which is also the Ultraman Australia swim start/finish and the finish of all three days. She is out and about riding on the Day Two Ultraman course.The guy who took them swimming is an Ultra-mate and legendary Noosa Lifeguard Seano Clancy.

6 Triathlon Legends & World Champions - Where Are They Now?
https://www.google.com/...mb-XndHtRWOHXDndUUtq

Agree with both: over 10 minutes faster than Brownlee and Neumann, and as far as I can see the fastest Ironman ever (disregarding downhill swims and known short courses; Ditlev's outrageous Roth time was not an IM per se though clearly 'faster').
https://www.trirating.com/...an-distance-records/
Baekkegaard's marathon was to (his high) standard (sub-2:38 three times now), without any 'race pressure' but with a full on 4:01 bike. 'All' he has to do is race like this in a big race: FP swim, 4 hour bike and a sub-2:40 run: sorted.
Burton recorded the fastest ever Australian IM time, four minutes quicker than Neumann's at Kona 2022.
"helped his ranking" Note that this will not improve his current #11 PTO ranking: he's on 89.07 points with a lowest counting score of 88.53 from Roth. With the 5% bonus for a silver IM he'll get just under that 88.53 from earlier today.

"this takes a LOT of pressure off his planning for next year" I'd be interested to see your expanded take on that. I guess that the top 20 (of those that 'go long' and DB must be top 10) who are the ones for whom the IM Series is of interest, will do two IM Series IMs (two of: Texas, LP, Vitoria, Cairns, Frankfurt) and surely will expect to pick up a slot (if they're genuinely (as opposed to wishful) top 20). Maybe the competition in those will be too fierce and slots hard to come by.
A fair few (maybe 10) of those notional top 20 have qualified already, and those 'merely' validating can be discarded when considering slot allocation.
https://www.trirating.com/nice-kona-2024/

TOP 5 Times of all time
Rank Name Nation Actual Time Race
Kristian Blummenfelt© NOR (07:21:11) IM Cozumel on 2021-11-21
1 Magnus Elbaek Ditlev DEN 07:24:40 Challenge Roth on 2023-06-25
2 Jan Frodeno GER 07:27:53 Tri Battle on 2021-07-18
3 Patrick Lange GER 07:30:04 Challenge Roth on 2023-06-25
4 Jan Frodeno GER 07:35:39 Challenge Roth on 2016-07-17
5 Magnus Elbaek Ditlev DEN 07:35:48 Challenge Roth on 2022-07-03

Precisely.
All downhill swim or not "Ironmans".
#Watch my lips: "the fastest Ironman ever (disregarding downhill swims and known short courses; Ditlev's outrageous Roth time was not an IM per se though clearly 'faster')."Relevance?
Relevance?

haha that aged well... top two went under Max's time and Burton 3:59 bike!

I more interested in the fellow who rode 6.30 on a BMX bike, any race photos around?

nice

What I love about this dude riding 6:30, is that at some point out there he would have inevitably passed someone on a tri bike wearing an aero helmet who thought, "Oh shit! I can't stay with him."

There's a story with this guy - him and his brother used to joke about doing an Ironman on a BMX.

His brother committed suicide over a year ago. He decided to follow through, and was raising funds for charity (ruok?)

Apparently he also had 8 speed gears in his hub.

I love this guy.....

Another plug for Noosa and JR and love for the girl that knows everyone,Belinda Granger.

Why do some countries with relatively small populations - Denmark, NZ, and others - turn out so many amazing athletes?

I'd guess in general it's the combination of these small countries
1. generally having strong federation support with government funding
2. Higher population density so that money that gets spent on infrastructure benefits a greater proportion of the population ie, build a bike path in Oklahoma and it likely costs more and gets used by orders of magnitude less people.
3. Network affects of sport in these higher density, small nations helps in some ways maybe too. Often no one within 100 miles of me can name a pro triathlete. Likely not the case in Denmark.

Speaking as someone from New Zealand, it's because of the lifestyle & culture we lead growing up. Go down to any local park on a Saturday morning and there will be 1000s of kids playing sport. Summer or winter, rain or shine, they'll be out there.

The schools I grew up in basically made playing at least 1 sport mandatory but myself and many of my friends played at least 3-4. From a tri perspective, there is the Weetbix Tryathlon which has been around since I was very young (1992 it says).

And then there's the fact that kids see New Zealanders exceeding and winning so of course want to replicate that in life. Top schools provide resources for those who excel in sport to take it to the next level and our Government and Olympic programs tend to also be pretty reasonable as well.

It all adds up, but it's pretty neat to see New Zealand top (or be near the top) for per capita golds in almost everything it participates in. Except Tokyo because damn you Flora Duffy!

But, all that aside it can also have a negative effect. Top sports stars get very special treatment and shit like sexual assault, assault, DUIs, etc, get swept under the rug if you're good enough. Not to mention if half the effort we put into sport went into other areas of our social environment we'd be much better off across the board.

You got many good answers below:

More for DK:
Strong swimming country, mandatory swimming in school, surrounded by water.
Wealthy nation, and triathlon requires wealth.
A good work life balance allows time for sport
Much better cycling/running infrastructure than e.g. US.
And inspiration from previous generations+having ironman +ironman 70.3 events in the country. We had two top males which names i totally forgot right now. Then a decade of, vesterby, pedersen, frederiksen and now the males again with ditlev/daniel and micki.

.
.
Hands down one of my all time favorite Triathlon characters..