A wise Finnish man once said: «Immer ein bissli besser» (Always a bit better). With these words always in mind I went to Denmark to give this season a deserved good end…
After a nice trip by train tio Hamburg and from there with our electric Renault ZOE me and Jonas arrived in Kolding on Monday. The weather was shit, but we made the best out of it and just went for our first sprint training. And we had to realize, pretty difficult this danish sprint terrain. After we met our other companions (Johanka, Silvan and Matthias) we went to our little house which we had rented for the week.
Even though the weather was shit all week till friday the time flew by and I did some of my best sprint-O trainings in my life! From a KO-Day over a training on a almost blank map to some sprint interval, we had everything. Also a crash and a broken compass were part of my week (So @str8compass please send me a new compass I don’t have any left;-))
So in the end of the week it was time for the two World Ranking Events. As a first year elite and therefore number 300 something of the world I hoped to at least get in the Top 150 after the two races on the weekend. Feeling tired but prepared after a quality week I felt ready to compare my level with some of the best (like Kasper Fosser, Yannick Michiels, Joey Hadorn etc…)
Sprint WRE Aabenraa
On Saturday in the quali I was long on a good way to qualify only some seconds behind Kasper, but sadly I did one more bigger mistake in the end. Still it was pretty easily enough to qualify for the A-Final in the afternoon. My race there was then too much pushing and too little map reading, so with almost 1′ time loss with mistakes I finished on the 22nd spot. So that was then more «ein bissli schlechter» than «ein bissli besser». But there was luckily still Sunday and my first real Knock Out competition coming.
KO-WRE Billund
Feeling not that well rested anymore, it took me pretty long to get my legs ready for the quali. Luckily my heat was not too strong and I made it to the KO rounds in the afternoon. Choosing a «as easy as possible» heat was then my goal for the heatchoice. Well with Ricci choosing the same heat just after me I was a bit scared at first… But it turned out to be a really good decision! With some good team tactics we made it easily through to the semi finals.
With Joey waiting there and also Ricci coming with me to the semi final 2 there were two EOC finalists with me in the heat. So I pretty much saw my season break standing at the finish line;-). Well things don’t always go as expected, especially not in knock out sprint. As only me and Ulrik Astrup Arnesen saw the a bit unlucky placed startflag we got a big gap on the others already in the beginning. On the tricky Legohouse (Picture 3) I somehow found the way without loosing too much time and qualified for the Final. So no trainingsbreak but a battle with the number 1 of sprint World Ranking.
With Ulrik from my heat, Chris Smithard, Timo Suter, Teemu Oksanen, Tuomas Heikkilä and Yannick Michiels from the other 2 semi finals it was time to battle for some WRE points;-). In Swiss German we would say «Die hei losgleit wie d Füürwehr» so I almost couldn’t keep up the first two controls. Then the speed got a bit slower and I got more and more confident. I realized soon that nobody wanted to try anything and just followed one another. So I decided to be the one to try and get a gap. I wasn’t planning on running away but more taking the short routes and saving energy for my final kick. It worked twice and so I even had a little gap after the second last control. With Timo Suter pushing behind me I really couldn’t chill at all but I managed to keep this small gap till the finish line! Some would say I made genius moves some would say I was just lucky, well decide on your own;-).
An so with the wise words «Immer ein bissli besser» it was there my first international elite win… It’s not a big competition like a World Cup etc. but with some big guys standing at the start I’m still pretty proud about this last season competition. So with the O-Season 2021 being over I would like to thank my sponsors ans supporters especially Proffix, Salomon, OL Plus and Sporthilfe Schweiz which make trips and competitions like these possible. Peace out and see you in 2022!
