Mendez, Erbenova win XTERRA Sweden

Photos / Results

Hellasgarden, Sweden (August 13, 2016) – Mauricio Mendez and Helena Erbenova won the third annual XTERRA Sweden elite titles on a beautiful day in Stockholm this afternoon.

The win is Mendez’ second in three weeks and Erbenova’s second in a row, fifth on the XTERRA European Tour this year and 23rd of her career.

XTERRA World Tour managing director Dave Nicholas was on-site to take in all the action and brings us this report…

The weatherman got it right and the day was a good one.  Cloudy and cool early and it got better by the hour. Promptly at 1pm the pro field took the deep water start.  Water temp was 18-degrees so everyone was in wetsuits; the age groupers followed two-minutes behind.

Mauricio Mendez came out of the water just a few feet in front of Sam Osborne but Sam “Bam” crushed the transition and literally gained about 20-seconds on the young Mexican.  South African Theo Blignaut was 3rd out followed by Arthur Forissier.  Forissier immediately ran into trouble when his shifter malfunctioned and his chain stuck between gears.

The bike belonged to Sam.  He rode evenly, smoothly and fast.

“I know I try to go too hard on the bike and I miss my lines and go off the road too much” he grinned.  “Today I said to myself, keep calm.  I hit my lines and had a great ride”.

Mendez was riding well but was losing time to the Kiwi.  At the end of the first lap Osborne increased to a 30+ second lead over Mendez who had about 30-seconds on Yeray Luxem and Arthur Serrieres.  Kris Coddens was coming quickly but ran into trouble.  Kris had caught the dueling duo of Luxem and Serrieres but no sooner did he get by and made an error on a small crossing and went down.

“My back hurt a little bit.  I don’t think it was from the crash but I did not feel 100-percent,” said the tall Belgian.  “I couldn’t gain the time back and thought I would go pretty hard and then give it on the run.”

Erbenova

At the end of lap 1, Helena Erbenova had taken the lead back from Carina Wasle and looked very comfortable.

Near the end of the bike, Osborne was up by over a minute; Luxem had caught Mendez, and Serrieres had dropped back a bit.  Erbenova led handily but Carina Wasle had dropped back behind Spain’s Mayalen Noriega who was pursued by a very fast age grouper, Marie Nilsson.  Carina had broken her foot just four weeks ago and was not sure how far she could go, but our little Austrian rocket is a tough woman and she kept going to eventually finish 5th.

Coming into T2, Sam had a solid lead of over one-minute, but had two very fast runners behind.  Yeray passed Mauricio in T2 and they headed out over the Swedish bridge onto the run.

“Yeray took off very fast and I said this is a good pace, we will catch Sam,” breathed the young winner.  “I was worried about Yeray because of last week when I could not catch him, so I ran really hard to stay with him.”

Luxem was thinking the same thing in reverse.  “I knew Mau was fast and this was a better track for him than Poland so I went hard right from the beginning.  He went by me and I really pushed but simply did not have the speed to stay with him” said Luxem.

Sam’s lead was strong enough that he held it going out onto the second lap by 20-seconds over Mendez who had the same on Luxem.  It was about 1K into the second loop when Sam faltered.

“I knew they were coming and guess I was not paying attention.  I hit something and my ankle twisted badly.  I didn’t go down, but they were past me immediately,” said Osborne.

This is the kind of run that Mendez thrives on.  Twisty and tight, but not as slow as Poland and he could stretch his speed and make time.

Kris Coddens had come into T2 in 5th but caught and passed young Arthur Serrieres to bring home 4th.  Arthur Forissier rode and ran hard to make up for his mechanical problems and finished 6th behind Serrieres.  Talk about the young guns taking over – Mendez was born in 1995 and Serrieres and Forissier in 1994.  Toss in Austrian Dominic Wychera, born in 1993, and we have 4 men in the top 10 who are less than 23-years-old!!

Helena was pacing herself.  “These races are never easy,” she sighed.

“I could not go too easy because then I’d lose focus so I made a good pace and I am very happy,” our champion smiled.

Behind, age grouper Marie Nilsson had passed into second place ahead of Swedish pro Cecilia Jessen.

“This is my home course,” Nilsson said.  “I know these trails and practice them often.”

Poor Carina came around on the first lap of the run in 2nd but got lost, then cramped up and had to sit in the beautiful Swedish forests for a bit.  Noriega was not comfortable on the rocky, technical trails and dropped back to finish 4th overall but 3rd Pro woman.

The second of our northern swing trio is finished.  Both showed us great races and now we head into the XTERRA European Championship race where the field will be super strong.  Yeray will not be there as he has family commitments, but Mendez, Osborne and Coddens will be there to go up against Ruzafa, Serrano, Carloni, Bradley Weiss and toss in Dominican winner Karl Shaw.

Michelle Flipo, winner in Switzerland will be back to go up against Erbenova, Bucher, Guillot-Boisset and Brigitta Poor and hopefully Carina will be one week healthier.  That should be one heck of a show.

Find pictures, videos, and more stories from XTERRA Sweden at:
https://www.facebook.com/xterrasweden // https://www.facebook.com/xterraeurope

Men top 5Web

ELITE RESULTS:

XTERRA Sweden (Stockholm) August 13, 2016             Pos Name, NAT Time Points 1 Mauricio Mendez, MEX 2:19:26 75 2 Yeray Luxem, BEL 2:20:16 67 3 Sam Osborne, NZL 2:21:21 61 4 Kris Coddens, BEL 2:26:02 56 5 Arthur Serrieres, FRA 2:26:33 51 6 Arthur Forissier, FRA 2:27:36 47 7 Theo Blignaut, RSA 2:30:17 43 8 Thomas Kerner, GER 2:33:09 39 9 Dominik Wychera, AUT 2:33:40 36 10 Norbert Durauer, AUT 2:34:59 33 11 Jari Palonen, SWE 2:39:45 30 12 Fabrizio Bartoli, ITA 2:41:13 27 13 Simone Calamai, ITA 2:41:49 25 Pos Name, NAT Time Points 1 Helena Erbenova, CZE 2:41:54 75 2 Cecilia Jessen, SWE 2:59:37 67 3 Mayalen Noriega, ESP 3:08:18 61 4 Sandra Santanyes, ESP 3:25:50 56 5 Carina Wasle, AUT 3:36:42 51

Complete Results

RUZAFA, POOR STILL ON TOP OF XTERRA EUROPEAN TOUR RANKINGS

Helena Erbenova keeps winning races but isn’t moving up in the standings because she maxed out her Silver-scoring race points by Greece, Poland, Belgium to start her season.  In the next two races is where she can make her move, as elite athletes count their best 4 Gold and 3 Silver finishes (the next two events are Gold races in Germany and Denmark).
Up Next: August 20 – XTERRA European Championship (Zittau, Germany)

2016 XTERRA EUROPEAN TOUR POINT STANDINGS                   After 9 – 8.13.16                                             Men     S S S S G G S S S Pl Name, NAT TOTAL MLT GRE POR BEL SUI FRA ITA POL SWE 1 Ruben Ruzafa, ESP 342 DNS 67 75 DNS 100 100 DNS DNS DNS 2 Kris Coddens, BEL 323 DNS x47 DNS 75 90 41 DNS 61 56 3 Yeray Luxem, BEL 299 DNS DNS 67 x27 DNS 90 DNS 75 67 4 Sam Osborne, NZL 253 DNS DNS x51 67 58 DNS 67 DNS 61 5 Mauricio Mendez, MEX 217 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 75 67 75 6 Roger Serrano, ESP 211 75 75 61 DNS DNF DNS DNS DNS DNS 7 Francois Carloni, FRA 205 DNS 51 56 61 DNS 37 x51 DNS DNS 8 Peter Lehmann, GER 194 51 DNS DNS DNS DNS 53 39 51 DNS 9 Brice Daubord, FRA 186 43 61 DNS DNS 82 DNS DNS DNS DNS 10 Jan Kubicek, CZE 185 DNS 36 DNS DNS 37 DNS 56 56 DNS 11 Veit Hoenle, GER 173 DNS DNS 23 DNS 75 75 DNS DNS DNS 12 Arthur Serrieres, FRA 167 DNS DNS DNS DNS 53 63 DNS DNS 51 13 Arthur Forissier, FRA 150 DNS 56 DNS DNS DNF DNS 47 DNS 47 14 Bradley Weiss, RSA 145 DNS DNS DNS DNS 63 82 DNS DNS DNS 15 Tomas Kubek, SVK 137 DNS 43 DNS 47 DNS DNS x23 47 DNS 16 Fabrizio Bartoli, ITA 127 47 DNS DNS 30 DNS DNS DNP 23 27 17 Maxim Chane, FRA 126 56 DNS DNS DNS DNS 34 36 DNS DNS 18 Henry Sleight, GBR 125 DNS DNS DNS 39 28 58 DNS DNS DNS 19 Damien Guillemet, FRA 120 DNS DNS DNS 51 DNS 69 DNS DNS DNS 20 Hannes Wolpert, GER 114 36 DNS 33 DNS 45 DNS DNS DNS DNS 21 Sebastian Norberg, SWE 111 DNS 25 DNS 43 DNS DNS DNS 43 DNF 22 Llewellyn Holmes, GBR 110 DNS DNS 25 33 DNS 31 21 DNS DNS 23 Jan Pyott, SUI 110 DNF 33 DNS DNS 34 DNS 43 DNS DNS 24 Christophe Betard, FRA 108 27 DNS DNS 36 DNS 45 DNS DNS DNS 25 Dominik Wychera, AUT 108 39 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 33 DNS 36 26 Mattia De Paoli, ITA 94 DNS DNS DNS DNS 69 DNS 25 DNS DNS 27 Pierre Guilhem, FRA 82 61 21 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 28 Max Neumann, AUS 79 DNS 30 DNS DNS 49 DNS DNS DNS DNS 29 Theo Blignaut, RSA 79 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 36 43 30 Markus Benesch, AUT 73 25 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 27 21 DNS 31 Cedric Lassonde, FRA 69 30 39 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 32 Jens Roth, GER 67 67 DNS DNS DNS DNP DNS DNS DNS DNS 33 Tomas Jurkovic, SVK 64 DNS DNS DNS DNS 31 DNS DNS 33 DNS 34 Karl Shaw, GBR 61 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 61 DNS DNS 35 Tim Van Daele, BEL 57 DNS 27 30 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 36 Nicolas Fernandez, FRA 56 DNS DNS DNS 56 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 37 Bartosz Banach, POL 49 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 49 DNS DNS DNS 38 José Estrangeiro, POR 47 DNS DNS 47 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 39 Max Sasserath, GER 43 DNS DNS 43 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 40 Anthony Pannier, FRA 41 DNS DNS DNS DNS 41 DNS DNS DNS DNS 41 Julen Loroño, ESP 39 DNS DNS 39 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 42 Aidan Nugent, RSA 39 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 39 DNS 43 Thomas Kerner, GER 39 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 39 44 Rui Dolores, POR 36 DNS DNS 36 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 45 Fabien Combaluzier, FRA 33 33 DNS DNS DNS DNF DNS DNS DNS DNS 46 Norbert Durauer, AUT 33 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 33 47 Stephen Bayliss, GBR 30 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 30 DNS DNS 48 Mester Balint, HUN 30 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 30 DNS 49 Jari Palonen, SWE 30 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 30 50 Ben Allen, AUS 28 DNS DNS DNS DNS 28 DNP DNS DNS DNS 51 Anthony Flinois, FRA 28 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 28 DNS DNS DNS 52 Gonzalo Orosco, ESP 27 DNS DNS 27 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 53 Emil Stoynev, BUL 27 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 27 DNS 54 Jim Thijs, BEL 25 DNS DNS DNS 25 DNS DNS DNP DNS DNS 55 Lubos Truhlar, CZE 25 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 25 DNS 56 Simone Calamai, ITA 25 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 25 57 Julien Buffe, FRA 23 DNF 23 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 58 Martial Schmidt, FRA 23 DNS DNS DNS 23 DNS DNP DNP DNS DNS 59 Tiago Maia, POR 21 DNS DNS 21 DNS DNP DHS DNS DNP DNS 60 Boris Chambon, FRA 21 DNS DNS DNS 21 DNS DNP DNS DNS DNS Women   S S S S G G S S S Pl Name, NAT TOTAL MLT GRE POR BEL SUI FRA ITA POL SWE 1 Brigitta Poor, HUN 347 75 67 x61 DNS 63 75 DNS 67 DNS 2 Renata Bucher, SUI 338 DNS DNS 51 DNS 75 90 61 61 DNS 3 Helena Erbenova, CZE 307 DNS 75 75 75 DNS 82 x67 x75 x75 4 Carina Wasle, AUT 295 DNS DNS 56 67 58 63 DNS DNS 51 5 Morgane Riou, FRA 273 67 51 DNS 61 49 45 DNS DNS DNS 6 Maud Golsteyn, NED 232 56 DNS 39 47 41 49 DNS DNS DNS 7 Ladina Buss, SUI 228 DNS 61 DNS DNS 69 DNS 51 47 DNS 8 Myriam Guillot, FRA 218 DNS DNS 67 DNS 82 69 DNS DNS DNS 9 Louise Fox, GBR 176 DNS 56 47 DNS 45 28 DNS DNS DNS 10 Lesley Paterson, GBR 175 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 100 75 DNS DNS 11 Jacqui Slack, GBR 148 DNS DNS DNS DNS 90 58 DNS DNS DNS 12 Elisabetta Curridori, ITA 130 DNS DNS DNS 43 31 DNS 56 DNS DNS 13 Kristina Lapinova, SVK 125 43 DNS DNS DNS DNS 31 DNS 51 DNS 14 Jessie Roberts, GBR 122 DNS DNS DNS 51 37 34 DNS DNS DNS 15 Sandra Koblemueller, AUT 114 61 DNS DNS DNS DNS 53 DNS DNS DNS 16 Diane Lee, GBR 103 47 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 56 DNS 17 Michelle Flipo, FRA 100 DNS DNS DNS DNS 100 DNS DNS DNS DNS 18 Danica Spiteri, MLT 86 39 DNS DNS DNS DNP DNS 47 DNS DNS 19 Lenka Cibulkova, CZE 78 DNS DNS DNS 39 DNP DNP DNS 39 DNS 20 Cecilia Jessen, SWE 67 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 67 21 Kara LaPoint, USA 65 DNS DNS DNS DNS 28 37 DNS DNS DNS 22 Mayalen Noriega, ESP 61 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 61 23 Isabelle Klein, LUX 56 DNS DNS DNS 56 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 24 Sandra Santanyes, ESP 56 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 56 25 Coralie Redelsperger, FRA 53 DNS DNS DNS DNS 53 DNS DNS DNS DNS 26 Alena Stevens, SVK 51 51 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 27 Sara Bernardez, ESP 43 DNS DNS 43 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 28 Belinda Hadden, AUS 43 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 43 DNS 29 Sanne Van Paassen, NED 41 DNS DNS DNS DNS DNS 41 DNS DNS DNS 30 Monica Cibin, ITA 34 DNS DNS DNS DNS 34 DNS DNS DNS DNS

Learn more at…

http://www.xterraeurope.com

http://www.xterraplanet.com/races/pro-racing

2016 XTERRA WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP QUALIFIERS

XTERRA Sweden was one of more than 30 events where the fastest amateur athletes from around the world could qualify to race at the 21st annual XTERRA World Championship at Kapalua, Maui on Oct 23.

DATE WORLD TOUR EVENT LOCATION or WINNERS 7-Feb XTERRA Philippines Brad Weiss/Lizzie Orchard 21-Feb XTERRA South Africa Brad Weiss/Flora Duffy 5-Mar XTERRA Motatapu Olly Shaw/Mary Gray 12-Mar XTERRA Saipan Brodie Gardner/Carina Wasle 20-Mar XTERRA Costa Rica Karl Shaw/Myriam Guillot-Boisset 26-Mar XTERRA Argentina Josiah Middaugh/Myriam Guillot-Boisset 3-Apr XTERRA Malta Roger Serrano/Brigitta Poor 16-Apr XTERRA New Zealand Braden Currie/Lizzie Orchard 17-Apr XTERRA La Reunion Ruben Ruzafa/Carina Wasle 23-Apr XTERRA Asia-Pacific Championship Braden Currie/Lizzie Orchard 7-May XTERRA Asia-Pacific Tour Championship Ben Allen/Jacqui Slack 7-May XTERRA Brazil Albert Soley/Sabrina Gobbo 7-May XTERRA Greece Roger Serrano/Helena Erbenova 14-May XTERRA Tahiti Josiah Middaugh/Lesley Paterson 21-May XTERRA Oak Mountain State Park Josiah Middaugh/Suzie Snyder 21-May XTERRA Portugal Ruben Ruzafa/Helena Erbenova 11-Jun XTERRA Belgium Kris Coddens/Helena Erbenova 25-Jun XTERRA Switzerland Ruben Ruzafa/Michelle Flipo 25-Jun XTERRA Mine over Matter Karsten Madsen/Suzie Snyder 3-Jul XTERRA France Ruben Ruzafa/Lesley Paterson 10-Jul XTERRA Victoria Karsten Madsen/Katie Button 16-Jul XTERRA Beaver Creek Josiah Middaugh/Julie Baker 31-Jul XTERRA Italy Mauricio Mendez/Lesley Paterson 31-Jul XTERRA Dominican Republic Rom Akerson/Suzie Snyder 6-Aug XTERRA Mexico Rom Akerson/Suzie Snyder 7-Aug XTERRA Poland Yeray Luxem/Helena Erbenova 13-Aug XTERRA Sweden Mauricio Mendez/Helena Erbenova 20-Aug XTERRA European Championship Zittau, Germany 3-Sep XTERRA Japan Hokkaido 4-Sep XTERRA Denmark Mons Klint 17-Sep XTERRA USA / Pan Am Championship Ogden, Utah, USA 23-Oct XTERRA World Championship Kapalua, Maui

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