Swedish Open Championships - Uppsala, SWE - 09&10/10/06
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| We arrived in Uppsala on Friday evening after an hours minibus ride from Stockholm. The competition took place over two days with the women fencing, shooting and swimming on the saturday and ride and run on the sunday morning. I was really excited to be back competing at an international level and couldn't wait to get started with the competition. |
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There was a fairly relaxed atmosphere at the competition venue possibly due to the small size of the competition. The fencing was the first event of the day and because of the low numbers in the womens events we fenced each opponent for two hits, followed by another round against the same opponents for one hit. In total we fenced each opponent for 3 hits. The standard of fencing was farily novice as many looked very inexperienced. I think, for some athletes it was the first ever comeptition they had done. Despite having much more experience than many of my opponents, it is sometimes tricky to fence novices as they often don't react how you would expect them to, or they tend to do something that you don't really expect. I think it requires a great deal of patience and it is a different way of fencing for me. Overal I did well and scored 1000points. |
| The shoot was next. The range was fairly small and quite noisy (I think there was a bowling range above the hall!) but well lit. I found a good rhythm and executed each shot well. My first series of 5 shots were fairly spread but the rest was good. I was very happy the way I had executed my 20 shots. I scored 175 (1036points). The swim was in a 25m pool. I had been feeling in good shape in training and was looking forward to seeing what time I could achieve. I was the clear winner of the swim in a time of 2.18 (a season's best) giving me a socre of 1256. I went to bed that night as overal leader of the competition with a score of 3292 and 416 points ahead of the next competitor. I can say that I slept very well that night. |
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The ride course was fairly small as they had borrowed horses from private owners and the organisers were worried about making it too difficult for the horses. It was a very straight forward course but having watched the men's competition the day before, I was well aware that it might not always ride as easily. All the horses looked pretty sprightly and good jumpers. Luckily the horse I drew was no different and was a very sweet jumper. We had one pole knocked down due to a lack of momentum from a turn. I was fairly happy with the results although I was disappointed with the knock down as it was due to rider error. Thankfully the one knocked only cost me 30points and wasn't enough to make much of a dent on my 400point lead. |
| I started the run in first place with 1minute 36seconds headstart over the 2nd place athlete. It was such a luxury and my coach and I decided that I would run fairly easy and save my energy for the world cup in Cairo on the thurday where I would probably have to run a lot harder. It was a good feeling being able to take the run easy and an even nicer feeling crossing the line in 1st place. |
| After the presentation there was a mad dash back to the hotel to pack and leave inorder to catch our flight back to the UK. I'd say it was the perfect competition for me to make my international comeback at. The Swedes were extremely friendly and the relaxed atmosphere made it very enjoyable. I was really pleased to win the competition and to have produced some really solid performances. |
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Competition Results |
Pos
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Athlete |
Shoot |
Fence |
Swim |
Ride |
Run |
Total |
1 |
Lindsey WEEDON (GBR) |
1036 |
1000 |
1256 |
1170 |
1000 |
5462 |
2 |
Anna ORNEVING (SWE) |
988 |
904 |
984 |
1200 |
888 |
4964 |
3 |
Isis DALTON (AUS) |
880 |
880 |
952 |
1200 |
928 |
4840 |
4 |
Rikke HJORT-JENSEN (DEN) |
940 |
760 |
1028 |
1110 |
716 |
4554 |
5 |
Dagny BENGS (FIN) |
796 |
904 |
532 |
1170 |
952 |
4354 |
6 |
Kinka BARVESTAD (SWE) |
784 |
1096 |
816 |
1200 |
448 |
4344 |
7 |
Eevi BENGS (FIN) |
616 |
640 |
636 |
1200 |
940 |
4032 |
8 |
Meeri LEINO (FIN) |
770 |
904 |
676 |
1140 |
492 |
3984 |
9 |
Elisa LAHDESMAKE (FIN) |
772 |
784 |
880 |
1000 |
0 |
3496 |
10 |
Karoliina HEINONEN |
688 |
808 |
728 |
880 |
340 |
3444 |
11 |
Minna BLOIGU (FIN) |
712 |
736 |
568 |
1170 |
0 |
3186 |
12 |
Cecillia ORNEVING (SWE) |
1084 |
688 |
1048 |
0 |
0 |
2820 |
13 |
Petre JOHANSSON (FIN) |
0 |
688 |
696 |
1200 |
108 |
2692 |
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