Daniela Ryf is a titan in the sport of triathlon, accomplishing the feat of being the only woman to defend the Ironman 70.3 World Championship title and one of only five women to defend the Ironman world title. She has also overtaken Chrissy Wellington’s record by winning five Ironman world championships, and overturned Wellington’s 12-year-old full distance record by nearly 10 minutes with a time of 8:08:21 at Challenge Roth 2023.

The Swiss star has also scored a million-dollar bonus for winning all three races of the 2015 Nasser Bin Hamad Triple Crown series, becoming triathlon’s first “million-dollar baby.”

Daniela was a mainstay on the ITU circuit and represented Switzerland at the 2008 and 2012 Olympics. In 2014 she burst onto the long-course scene in a big way: in a span of four months racing long-course almost every two weeks, she scored a streak of 8 race wins including her debut Ironman in Switzerland, another Ironman win in Copenhagen, and the Ironman 70.3 World Championship in Mont Tremblant, Canada. It was a sign of greater things to come.