{"id":7767,"date":"2021-03-14T20:11:05","date_gmt":"2021-03-14T20:11:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sportsnewsforyou.com\/?p=7767"},"modified":"2021-03-14T20:11:05","modified_gmt":"2021-03-14T20:11:05","slug":"otillo-swimrun-1000-lakes-the-toughest-swimrun-yet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/?p=7767","title":{"rendered":"\u00d6till\u00d6 Swimrun 1000 Lakes: the toughest swimrun yet?"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cYou\u2019ll be hot, cold, hot, cold \u2013\u00a0that\u2019s the nature of swimrun\u2026\u201d says Michael Lemmel.\u00a0<\/strong>\u201cOr, in the case of this race,\u201d muses fellow race director Mats Skott, \u201ccold, cold, cold cold\u2026\u201d\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

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We\u2019re at the race briefing for the inaugural \u00d6till\u00d6 World Series 1000 Lakes race in Rheinsberg, Germany and not one of the 150 teams starting are underestimating the challenge ahead. The next day we\u2019ll face a 43km course that includes 10km of lake swimming in temperatures ranging from 10-14 degrees, plus the air temperatures are unseasonably cold, too. Brrrr.<\/p>\n

Early start<\/p>\n

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Race day dawns fresh and misty and we\u2019ve got a 7am coach trip to the start line in the town of Wesenberg. I\u2019m racing again with four-times World Champs finisher G\u00f6ran Wernqvist, who was my partner earlier in the year for the \u00d6till\u00d6 Swimrun Isles of Scilly race. We\u2019ve been tempted back by the promise of a fast, flat course timed to take in the autumnal beauty of the Mecklenburger Seenplatte area and as the coach weaves through the darkness we get glimpses of enchanted forests and calm, clear lakes. There\u2019s no doubt \u2013 this is going to be an epic course.<\/p>\n

Race prep hasn\u2019t gone quite to plan though. A niggle in my calf has flared up and my physio diagnoses a problem with the peroneal nerve and the tissue around it. Frantic icing and taping in the days before settles it a little and as racing won\u2019t make it worse, it will just be painful, we decide to go ahead. We\u2019ve been looking forward to the race for a long time and training hard, so we don\u2019t want to miss it!<\/p>\n

Race start is in the town hall courtyard and the atmosphere is great, with plenty of local support and drones buzzing ahead. Michael Lemmel counts down and we\u2019re off \u2013 heading through cobbled streets out of the town and then onto single file forest trails. This first run is 4km and the pace feels good \u2013 we\u2019re keeping up with the pack and getting nice and warm in our zipped-up wetsuits, which we know is important before jumping in chilly water.<\/p>\n

Into the water<\/p>\n

G\u00f6ran and I did the final 500m swim on the course as prep the day before and the water temperatures felt chilly but ok \u2013\u00a0once you get used to the face freeze \u2013 so we\u2019re feeling good about the swimming ahead. We swim tethered as G\u00f6ran is a much faster swimmer than me, so we clip the elastic line between our belts, pull our goggles down and head into the water. This first swim is 900m and with the water temperature around 10 degrees and air temperature around 7 degrees, we can see mist rising off the water around us. It\u2019s both magical and spooky, all at the same time.<\/p>\n

Mist rises off one of the early lake swims. Image: Jakob Edholm\/\u00d6till\u00d6<\/em><\/p>\n

The temperatures feel ok and we\u2019re getting into a good rhythm with the swimming and I\u2019m enjoying seeing glimpses of the beautiful forests as I turn to breathe. It doesn\u2019t feel long before we\u2019re out of the water and into the second run, which is a short one at 1.2km, and it\u2019s here that the problems start. We\u2019d hoped the cold water would blunt my calf pain, but in fact it\u2019s caused my ankle to lock up and I\u2019m struggling to run already. Our pace drops to 8:38min\/km which, even despite the uneven terrain, is way below our planned pace!<\/p>\n

Running took in amazing autumnal colours and magical forests. Image: Nadja Odenhage\/\u00d6till\u00d6<\/em><\/p>\n

The second swim is another long one at 1,370m and takes in a bend in a lake, so we first head out to a flashing beacon and \u00d6till\u00d6-branded buoy, then turn and head to a second buoy. Once we make the turn though, I\u2019m starting to feel the cold so concentrate hard on my swim technique instead, something I\u2019ve been working on with Total Immersion coach Tracey Baumann, who trains long-distance open water swimmers. This really helps and again I\u2019m enjoying being in the water and we\u2019re making good progress, with G\u00f6ran powering ahead in front.<\/p>\n

Tough times<\/p>\n

It\u2019s in the last 200m of the swim that things fall apart. G\u00f6ran later tells me that all of a sudden he felt very aware of me behind him and he knew I was struggling. The key to swimming tethered is to keep the same rhythm and rotate in the same way as your partner, and once you stop doing that, you both start struggling rather than flowing through the water together. At the time I don\u2019t really know what\u2019s happened, I just find I\u2019m struggling to breathe \u2013 plus my stroke\u2019s obviously fallen apart!<\/p>\n

Getting out of the swim we\u2019re at the first race cut-off point and actually, doing pretty well \u2013 we\u2019re in position 99\/150 and have made it with time to spare. G\u00f6ran\u2019s feeling the cold too, but it\u2019s obvious to him by now that I\u2019m not going to make it \u2013 I\u2019m shaking uncontrollably and passing swimrunners keep asking if I\u2019m alright! A big part of the sport is taking care of your partner though and this is why you race in teams of two, so G\u00f6ran makes the call. \u201cOk, I think here we\u2019ll break,\u201d he says, before shepherding me towards the race HQ in a country house at the cut-off where there\u2019s medical support, a roaring fire and hot tea. Funnily enough as we enter we see one of the reigning women\u2019s world champs Annika Ericsson sat by the fire waving hello to us \u2013 it turns out some of the best teams in the sport were struggling with the cold conditions as well!<\/p>\n

The run up to the first cut-off point, where 220\u2019s team called it a day! Image: Jakob Edholm\/\u00d6till\u00d6<\/em><\/p>\n

The support team are fantastic \u2013 we get wrapped in blankets and handed herbal tea (although I\u2019m still shaking so much I can\u2019t hold mine!) and it doesn\u2019t take long to start thawing out. I feel bad that G\u00f6ran had to stop as well, as I have no doubt that he could have finished the race. \u201cThis is swimrun though,\u201d he says. \u201cYou start as a team, you finish as a team and if you break, you break as a team.\u201d I\u2019m grateful for his good humour, strength and support.<\/p>\n

Looking at the course later, the next run was only 1.7km and we\u2019d then have had another longish swim of 725m. With my injury I was finding it hard to run fast enough to warm up between the swims so we absolutely made the right call \u2013 it wouldn\u2019t have been sensible for us to carry on. We later find out that the \u00d6till\u00d6 organisers redesigned the course during the race to remove one long swim \u2013\u00a0plus another had already been modified the day before so it ended up totalling 7.5km of swimming, rather than 10km. Despite that, 49 teams still didn\u2019t make it. Nobody ever said this sport was easy!<\/p>\n

At the finish<\/p>\n

As we get ferried on to a coach to the finish line to hot showers, bratwurst and Gluhwein with rum (posting my first ever DNF isn\u2019t all bad, it seems!) the race continues \u2013 and once warm again, we head to the finish line to see the winning teams across the line. The first team to finish are a men\u2019s team, Swedish Team Terrible Tuesdays Triathlon of Sweden, Pontus Lindberg and George Bj\u00e4lkemo, in a winning time of 4:42:02. \u201cOur game plan was to get a gap on the runs, where we knew that we could accelerate,\u201d said Bj\u00e4lkemo, \u201cIt was hard as our legs were so stiff from the cold but we managed!\u201d<\/p>\n

Team Terrible Tuesdays Triathlon cross the finish line. Image: Nadja Odenhage\/\u00d6till\u00d6<\/em><\/p>\n

Mixed team Jasmina Glad-Schreven and Thomas Schreven, Team Say No To Doping! from Finland came in second, finishing in 4:47:59. The first women\u2019s team, Diane Sadick and Fanny Danckwardt-Lilliestr\u00f6m, Team Orca, cross the finish line at 5:33:45.<\/p>\n

For team 220 Swimrun, there are lessons learnt here but despite not finishing the race, it was a wonderful experience and weekend among some of the most inspirational (and friendly!) people in multisport. \u00d6till\u00d6 Swimrun 1000 Lakes set a new standard of endurance for swimrun and will undoubtedly see athletes back next year to take on a course that is faster and flatter than many other \u00d6till\u00d6 races, but challenging in new ways. If you fancy racing in fairytale forests and calm lakes \u2013 and don\u2019t mind being more than a little chilly \u2013\u00a0then make your way to Rheinsberg next year.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

As for us? Some rest and injury rehab (and possibly some work over the winter on acclimatising to cold water!) and we\u2019ll be back for more swimrun fun. If you never fail, then you haven\u2019t challenged yourself hard enough \u2013 but that\u2019s not to say that you shouldn\u2019t take on those challenges again and beat them\u2026 Bring on the 2017 season!<\/p>\n

Tempted by swimrun? Read our beginner\u2019s guide\u00a0and find out more about the gear needed in this article.<\/p>\n

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Find out more about the \u00d6till\u00d6 World Series on the official website.<\/p>\n<\/section>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cYou\u2019ll be hot, cold, hot, cold \u2013\u00a0that\u2019s the nature of swimrun\u2026\u201d says Michael Lemmel.\u00a0\u201cOr, in the case of this race,\u201d muses fellow race director Mats Skott, \u201ccold, cold, cold cold\u2026\u201d\u00a0 Advertisement We\u2019re at the race briefing for the inaugural \u00d6till\u00d6 World Series 1000 Lakes race in Rheinsberg, Germany and not one of the 150 teams…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7767","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7767","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=7767"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7767\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=7767"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=7767"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=7767"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}