Swedish Multisport Champs

After staying in the cozy flat of Juliette's for a week enjoying some great orienteering forests right nearby we reached the weekend. Chris and I were planning to race in the 'Swedish Multisport Champs' held in near Vaxholm (a town some way out in into the archipelago from Stockholm). However, the day before Aaron rang up to say that Anna (who was going to race with Sara) was sick and so I decided to dump Chris as my teammate and race with Sara instead (-; Chris would get the marvelous opportunity to be my support crew!


The day started off crisp and misty, but as we headed off into the forest on the first orienteering run it gradually cleared and the sun lit up the yellow autumn leaves.

The transition area

We were running with some other girls teams when we reached a river which we had to swim across, it was mighty cold. Thanks to Sara's cunning we came in to the paddle first equal with another team. Then we headed out onto the beautifully calm waters of the archipelago and navigated our way around little islands and under bridges to collect 5 more controls.


Chris and Anna doing a good job of being support crew


In our single kayaks we could just hold off the other female teams who were all in these double canoe things.


After the kayaking we hopped on our bikes for the mountain bike orienteering section. The first bit was pretty tricky following a very rocky and slippery single track. We made a little mistake when we couldn't find the track we were after and I got zapped by an electric fence, but we kept going and the terrain got a bit easier again.

By the time we zoomed into the last transition we knew we had a good lead for the last orienteering section, I was very glad given how stiff my legs had become. We ran through the forest to collect the last 5 controls then into the finish, yaaaah!


We were both stoked to win the women's section of the Swedish Champs (-: Chris and Aaron went for a mad forest run afterwards to burn some energy before we all went out for a well earnt pizza along with Anna and Anders and little Karin and Mia.

Comments

Shoeless Joe said…
Thats bloody great to hear! good on you em! Nice flip of roles for you and chris. Sara is pretty cunning thats for real. Now you are a multisport champ too! HeHe.

Joe

thinking of doing the coast again. But not to go hard - barefoot. People get sooo wrapped up in what gear they must have that I'd like to do it on my old as steel mtb (with upgraded componentry) and without shoes. training run thru the mingha is going to be the deciding factor.
October 9, 2008 at 11:29 PM
Kate Pedley said…
Awesome! Well done Em and Sara!! Love that Chris got to be support crew :) Thanks for your email Em - I'm going to reply as soon as I have some time to sit down and write a long one so we can think about where to meet you guys next year :)

Hmm, just read Joes post - lol!

Hugs, Kate
October 16, 2008 at 12:55 PM
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