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.”
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
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 51Complete 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)
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, MauiThe post Mendez, Erbenova win XTERRA Sweden appeared first on XTERRA.
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