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4 most popular triathlon stories of 2021

From a world champion getting hit by a car while leading a race to the Iron Cowboy calling out Ironman, our readers enjoyed a wide variety of stories this year

Photo by: Vincent Luis Instagram

With the COVID-19 pandemic derailing the early part of the triathlon season, it was an interesting year to try and report on triathlon news. As racing returned, though, there certainly was lots to cover as we witnessed a whirlwind season with lots of record-setting and stunning performances. That said, our two most popular stories in 2021 involved a car accident at a race and the back-and-forth between Canadian James Lawrence and Ironman. Here’s a look at the four stories that most peaked the interest of our readers this year:

World champion triathlete Vincent Luis hit by car while leading Ironman 70.3

Earlier this month two-time World Triathlon champion Vincent Luis was hit by a car during Ironman 70.3 Indian Wells – La Quinta after being directed off course. The Frenchman was leading the race at the time and would get himself back near the lead entering T2, but wasn’t able to hang on to Canada’s Lionel Sanders on the run and would have to settle with second.

“My run was just a struggle and my only goal was to reach the finish line and have a check up with a doctor,” he wrote on Instagram after the race. “Congrats Lionel for the win and Jelle Geens for finishing 3rd.”

Iron Cowboy responds to Ironman: “I’m done with you”

We reported extensively on Canadian James Lawrence’s impressive feat of 101 straight full-distance efforts in 101 days, but by far the most read story we posted about the “Iron Cowboy” was after the 64th day of his endurance challenge after he received a message from Ironman asking him to “refrain from talking about your efforts as completing ‘IRONMANS.'”

“Hey @ironmantri – I don’t want anything to do with you,” began his post with his reply to the company.

In our story we also looked into whether or not Ironman tattoos might be considered copyright infringement.

PTO removes Kristian Blummenfelt’s 7:21 from record list

The last two stories in our top four revolve around the multiple record-setting performances we saw this year. After Canada’s Tamra Jewett’s record-setting half-marathon run from Ironman 70.3 Augusta was removed from the Professional Triathletes Organisation (PTO) all-time records list because the race featured a down-stream swim, we  reached out to the PTO to ask why Kristian Blummenfelt’s record-setting day at Ironman Cozumel was recognized on the site – that race featured a down-current swim that drastically shortened swim times. Our story on the removal of the record turned out to be our third-most popular story of the year. A few days later the PTO would remove the all-time records list from its site completely, sending out a press release to “clarify the misunderstanding of its ‘fastest times’ listing on the website as a result of an excellent article by Kevin Mackinnon in Triathlon Magazine Canada.”

Updated: What are the triathlon “world records” for each distance?

Based on all the impressive performances we saw in 2021, it’s hardly a surprise that another of our popular stories was this one that outlines the fastest recorded times for each distance in triathlon. As you can imagine, that story has gone through numerous updates in 2021.

Wondering what our most popular stories were last year? Click below to see what most interested our readers in 2020.

4 Most popular triathlon stories of 2020