Nothing in the race went as Lukas Krämer had planned: ”Under one hour swim? Didn’t work out! Cycling in less than 4:45 hours? Didn’t work out either! Running under three hours? Also a failure!” When you look at it, at first it seems like a complete failure, but if you look at the result, you cannot complain”, says Lukas Krämer, who became Ironman World Champion in the M30 category.

In the swim section Krämer had ”rather good legs”, but he could not swim any faster. ”Sometimes I thought, that maybe I could go a little faster, but when there’s four guys ahead of you swimming next to and stacked above each other … where do you seriously want to go?”

Looking at his watch in the transition zone between swimming and bike, Krämer was slightly shocked because more than an hour for the swim was a little much. In the end it wasn’t bad at all, especially since even the pros were a lot slower this year than before.

The first 50 km on the STEVENS Super Trofeo were quite chaotic as Krämer had been warned by his coach Wolfgang Ahrens. ”Permanent repeated overtaking. Sometimes I had to go as slow as 20 kph (12 mph) because so many guys passed me and I had to leave their slipstream in order not to be punished with a time penalty.”

On the highway to Hawi many competitors were punished for slipstream riding. About half way to Hawi strong crosswinds came up, Krämer: ”The ”pack” immediately split up. Being annoyed by the previous mess I began passing and suddenly found myself many positions ahead.
The final 100 km he was able to ride really well, mostly on his own or in small groups, that ”rode mostly fair as far as I could see it.”

Because Krämer felt ”quite good, still”, he could happily look forward to running. In the beginning it was really easy - at a pace of 4:10 min. per km. Krämer: ”All great, everything awesome, happily looking forward to reach the highway and having food. Suddenly a stitch! Legs felt good, but the stitch would not go away. ”It was hell. You feel fit yet you can’t keep running because of the stitch.” Mentally, Krämer went to the limit, he wrote – but because nobody passed him …”I am World Champion now.”

Epilogue:
Krämer has been a customer at the Surf +Bike Hütte (hut) in Peißenberg, Bavaria, Germany for a long time. “When thy showed me the STEVENS Super Trofeo last year, I knew this was going to be my bike! I just could not afford it.”

So Krämer, who is a firefighter and competes in the German triathlon Bundesliga (Federal League) with his team next year, went to Surf + Bike Hütte to see, what’s possible. Hannes Berger, business manager, came up with the idea of dealer sponsoring, supported by STEVENS, which “luckily worked out”, says Krämer.