Magnus Midtbø is a former world class competitive climber.
Now he is most famous for his Youtube channel where he is taking on different challenges. He has spent 24h with Blu. Working out with different really strong people. Done a lot of climbing.
This year Fredrik the Norseman race director got him to do Norseman.
Magnus had little specific trining. But of course he is extremely fit to start with.
Here you have his journey
You really believe that? I mean “2 weeks of training and not really able to swim to start with” part.
According to the video, in just two weeks he went from swimming 1.3km in 30min to doing the 3.8km in 1h17. He just got a tri bike; two weeks later he rides it for 180km, and descends on it passing seasoned triathletes.
Finishing 69th at the Norseman is a remarkable achievement, he’s a super fit and talented athlete who can do pretty much anything (I watched a lot of his videos). But the part “I only trained for two weeks” sounds a little bit like clickbait.
right… the bike is a pretty big red flag. I call 100% bullshit.
Yeah, anyone who knows anything about endurance sports should see that.
No one goes from no swim background/training to a 1h17 in 2 weeks without an absolutely unique talent for swimming(and he doesn’t look like he has that, he looks like someone who has practiced for a while).
It’s also impossible to gain the specific endurance for a 180km bike ride with that course profile in 2 weeks with no prior endurance training. What gives it away most though is his technical ability on a TT bike in that terrain. He looks like someone who has spent a fair bit of time on a bike and not someone who has only done a handful of rides in his life.
Perhaps most obvious is running a marathon after all that with virtually no run training, with his longest run being claimed to be 5km, and still passing people at the end of the run.
I get that Youtube means playing things up a bit but that’s just ridiculous and borderline irresponsible with the following he has. I don’t think triathlon needs more people who think they can do Ironmans with no prep.
Hear hear.
What annoyed me are his YouTube commenters who apparently believe this stuff, many of whom claim to be seasoned triathletes (even an ex pro).
Dude wastes time doing a VO2 max test in a lab instead of training the crap out of the time he has… even that didn’t raise their eyebrows.
I mean it only takes going back and watching his videos to see what his baseline training is. Sure, it’s clickbait in that hes training at a professional level year round for absurd challenges, but those are primarily strength based. He’s gotten better at the endurance aspect over the years but I don’t think it’s disingenuous to say that he only had two weeks of targeted training for this.
Look back at his video with Blu for a peak into his endurance ability just a year ago. It’s not great relative to how amazing an athlete he is.
I loved the inside look at the start line what an epic race - and convinced myself that the premise could be possible ? Perhaps ? if his ability to learn new skills like correct swim technique is matched with his elite VO2 max and climber strength?
Fantasy or not - thanks for the share
And this is exactly what blows apart the whole premise of “He’s training as a professional athlete year round so of course he can smash one of the hardest full distance triathlons out there with only 2 weeks of training”. His video with Blu shows him looking extremely “amateur” in comparison to his strength based videos. Not a shot he trained for this for only 2 weeks and got the result he did.
As a comparison, several years ago The Vegan Cyclist/VC Adventures did a spontaneous self-Ironman. The guy is a beast on the bike and has next level endurance. He even spent time training for the swim portion. At the end of the day the guy was suffering and was still walk/running well into the night.
1,4 millions has watched a triathlon video in two days.
That is good for the sport.
Also good for Norseman.
Any positiv spotlight on triathlon is good.
It was a relatively slow year for the swim too, due to the tide, with not many going under the hour. His 1:17 is very competitive under the circumstances.
I hate it that my youtube algorithm thinks that I want to watch those “I did insert race with zero or random training amount” videos. They are such a nuissance. I myself see the race as a reward for successful training, and hope to keep at it long-term. All those videos do is to cater to people who don’t believe they can find joy in the everyday lifestyle of triathlon, which is to me is what it’s about.
Exactly!! The gradual improvement is most of the fun. One and dones just don’t get it…
Magnus is amazing and an elite athlete. He has completed various endurance tests on his YouTube channel over the last several years, so he’s not just a climber. He ran a 1.5 mile test in 9 minutes 18 seconds, in one of his videos when he did the FBI fitness test qualifications.
Climbers are known to practice maximal efficiency to achieve a route and have the ability to know their body position well and change it to be more efficient. He actually has a little swimming background and am not surprised to see transformational improvements with excellent coaching. His upper body muscular endurance is fantastic from climbing.
An elite athlete that has more recently dabbled in some endurance is going to crush most amateur triathletes.
Yes. After training enough.
Slice it however you want. The video is 
And yet “I don’t think I’ve ever swam 1000m before” came out of his mouth in the Blu video.
Here’s a video of Magnus swimming a 100 meter free for time in June 2024 in 1:55. He’s the type of athlete that appears to be a super responder to proper coaching techniques. Something most triathlete swimmers are not.
I was a youth summer league swim coach for several years. I would say 10% of the kids would know how to make changes when I told them stroke technique improvements AND they would keep those changes going forward. 10% of the kids were never able to make any reasonable changes and the middle 80% could make a portion of changes.
Seeing Magnus’ swimming technique a year ago and seeing it in Norseman is one of the top 10% super responders to coaching instruction. It’s also a common attribute that has made him an elite level climber.
Super responder - hm… I don’t think so. Magnus swam a 1:17 with wetsuit, this is a bad time time in the water. Thorsten Schröder who was the last one to go up the mountain, has done IM Kona twice and notably has swimming down as his major issue still clocked 1:13 at least (he talked about it in a podcast). So a 57 year old full time Journalist was still 4 minutes faster.
Also I am sorry to say - I don’t want to get all wanky on results - but since it is a lot about the ranking he has achieved: 61st (or 69th overall) in the Norseman field which is based on a lottery and only has 250 competitors really isn’t THAT impressive. It is ok for some random extreme endurance athlete who is new to it but it’s barely Top 25% in Men and out of Top 25% of all. Sorry just had to vent on this quickly…
Don’t overwork your hand: it IS impressive that he was successful in a pure lottery with low chances of getting a start.
Lol must have been destiny