The 28-year-old bookended his effort with a 48min swim and stellar 2:30:50 marathon, but it was an incredible 3:24:22 bike split that made the major inroads into the incredible time.<\/p>\n
Skipper\u2019s performance of 6:47:36 can be argued to be equally as impressive. The Norfolk triathlete only received the call-up to race a week before when double-Olympic champion Alistair Brownlee pulled out injured<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n Skipper even led the contest for the first half of the marathon, helped by a 3:16:42 bike split as his team of time-trial specialists held a remarkable 55kmph for the 112-mile bike leg.<\/p>\n \u201cThat was tough,\u201d Blummenfelt said immediately post-race. \u201cEven sitting at the back of the bike, the guys were pushing so hard and kept us in the game. \u00a0We were riding well over pace.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s probably the best long course experience I\u2019d ever had,\u201d Skipper said. \u201cIt\u2019s been amazing to be part of the team and flying through 180km at 55kmph was pretty incredible.<\/p>\n \u201cThe team were awesome all week, they couldn\u2019t do any more. We took it to Kristian, rode quicker than we hoped for, and I was hoping he\u2019d blow on the run.\u201d<\/p>\n <\/p><\/div> <\/section> In contrast to the women\u2019s race, Blummenfelt and Skipper opted for just one swim pacer each for the swim.<\/p>\n This saved the majority of the support athletes for the bike leg, where both teams masterminded by Matt Bottrill (Blummenfelt) and Jacob Tipper (Skipper) believed any time savings could be maximised.<\/p>\n Despite having to withdraw from the challenge, double-Olympic champion Brownlee stayed on to help pace the 2.4-mile swim for Skipper in Lake Senftenberg.<\/p>\n But they could do little to prevent Blummenfelt \u2013 swimming in the wake of seven-time Dutch national champion Lars Botellier, taking an early lead and continuing to extend it throughout the point-to-point swim.<\/p>\n On to the bike and it was clear how much work had gone into drilling the team time trial formation throughout the preceding week.<\/p>\n Other than one close shave for Team Blummenfelt with a touch of wheels, both looked far more comfortable than you\u2019d expect when hurtling along at 55kmph.<\/p>\n Team Skipper were the fastest on the course and gradually ate into the lead before making the pass just after halfway through the bike leg. From there the gap increased to 2:30 by the time both athletes made it back to T2.<\/p>\n As the temperatures started to climb into the high twenties on the run, Skipper had taken the novel approach of his outrider carrying a tank of chilled water that could be sprayed over him when required.<\/p>\n But with Blummenfelt setting off with 2:09 marathon runner Barnaba Kipkoech for company he was not to be denied \u2013 and although Skipper produced a solid 2:36:43 run, the Norwegian ran out a worthy winner.<\/p><\/body><\/html>\n By Tim Heming Published: Sunday, 05 June 2022 at 12:00 am Both Britain\u2019s Joe Skipper and Norway\u2019s Kristian Blummenfelt smashed the hallowed 7hr mark in the Pho3nix Foundation\u2019s Sub7 event, but bragging rights went to reigning Olympic and Ironman champion Blummenfelt who took the tape first in an eye-watering 6:44:25. The 28-year-old bookended his effort […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":24,"featured_media":14556,"template":"","categories":[1],"acf":{"readingTimeMinutes":"3"},"uagb_featured_image_src":{"full":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win.jpg",2048,1364,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win-300x200.jpg",300,200,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win-768x512.jpg",768,512,true],"large":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win-1024x682.jpg",800,533,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win-1536x1023.jpg",1536,1023,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/uploads\/sites\/47\/2022\/06\/blummenfelt-and-skipper-break-7hrs-but-norwegian-takes-the-win.jpg",2048,1364,false]},"uagb_author_info":{"display_name":"importmanagerhub@sprylab.com","author_link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/author\/importmanagerhubsprylab-com\/"},"uagb_comment_info":0,"uagb_excerpt":"By Tim Heming Published: Sunday, 05 June 2022 at 12:00 am Both Britain\u2019s Joe Skipper and Norway\u2019s Kristian Blummenfelt smashed the hallowed 7hr mark in the Pho3nix Foundation\u2019s Sub7 event, but bragging rights went to reigning Olympic and Ironman champion Blummenfelt who took the tape first in an eye-watering 6:44:25. The 28-year-old bookended his effort…","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed\/14555"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rss_feed"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/rss_feed"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/24"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14556"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14555"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/220triathlon\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14555"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}How the race unfolded<\/strong><\/h2>\n
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