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By most measures, Norwegian triathlete Kristian Blummenfelt is the standard of peak performance in athletics. He won the gold medal in Triathlon at the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games. Kristian has also won both the Ironman World Championships (2021) and the Ironman 70.3 World Championships (2022).
Kristian Blummenfelt now appears to have set a record for having the highest VO2 Max ever recorded in a lab setting, beating the previous record set by 18-year-old Norwegian cyclist Oskar Svendsen (97.5 ml/kg/min).
What Is Kristian Blummenfelt’s VO2 Max Score?
Before we get to Blummenfelt’s new record, let us first broadly define what VO2 Max is in the first place. The broadest definition of VO2 Max that is widely used is that it “is a measure of physical fitness.” So simple, right?! Not so fast…
The ‘V’ stands for ‘Volume’ and the ‘O2’ stands for ‘Oxygen.’ And what it is measuring is how much oxygen your body consumes during strenuous exercise, measured in ml/kg/minute.
Oxygen enters our system through the lungs and finds its way to our red blood cells. From there it moves around the body to all of the moving parts, like the muscles which need oxygen to produce ATP which is the energy source shouldering the work load.
Higher VO2 Max = better/fitter. As we get older, it tends to decline. On average, men have a higher VO2 Max than women by about 26% ((6.6 mL/(kg·min)) according to this 2022 study titled ‘Updated Reference Standards for Cardiorespiratory Fitness Measured with Cardiopulmonary Exercise Testing.’
Elite VO2 Max And Setting Records
So what exactly is Kristian Bluemmenfelt’s VO2 Max? According to his latest Instagram post where he shared a video clip of him in a lab, with the mask on, measuring his oxygen consumption, he now has the highest VO2 Max ever recorded.
The previous records was held by Norwegian cyclist Oskar Svendsen (97.5 ml/kg/min) who set the record at 18-years-old. Kristian Blummenfelt turns 32 years old on Valentine’s Day. Despite the age gap, Kristian Blummenfelt showed evidence of a 101.1 ml/kg/min result on the test. Scroll through his Instagram slides here to see the video proof:
How Does Kristian Blummenfelt Have Such A High VO2 Max?
Blummenfelt won the 2025 Ironman Pro Series and took home a $200,000 bonus for that on top of his $153,500 individual race winnings. It is WILD that the fittest athlete ever measured earned just $353,500 from actual competition (not including sponsorships).
His typical workload while training, according to reports, is about 10 km swimming, 300km cycling, and 100km running. For the other Americans like myself, that is approximately 6.21 miles in the pool each week, 186.41 miles on the bike, and 62.14 miles running. Every single week. This video from last year shows someone trying to keep up in a day of his life and learning just how fit the world’s fittest man is.
When Kristian Blummenfelt won the 2021 Ironman World Championship (St. George), his split times were 49:40 for the 1.2 mile swim, 4:18:42 for the 112 mile (180.2 km) bike ride, and a full 26.2 marathon time of 2:38:01 to finish it off.
THAT is what it takes to reach the highest V02 Max ever measured. All of that on top of perfect diet, sleep, regulated training, and presumably impeccable genetics because if everyone could pull this off then someone else would have eclipsed 100 VO2 Max before now.
For those curious, this is what his lab testing looks like. This video is actually from a year ago but the tests remain the same:
Have you ever had your VO2 Max tested? I have been looking int doing a VO2 Max + Dexa Body Composition combined test but they are not cheap. Local places want to charge over $500 for the two tests but as a blossoming triathlete myself, I would love to know my numbers.
According to my watch, my current VO2 Max is 54.3 which puts me above the 90th percentile for my age, which I think is great. But fitness wearables are notoriously poor at measuring scores like VO2 Max, often underestimating significantly. One writer from Barron’s did a test years ago and compared it to their Apple Watch and their score was off considerably.
All of that is to say, if you are curious about your own VO2 Max score and want to learn more about it in general, you can visit this Harvard article to learn more as well as search for VO2 Max lab tests in your area.