ÖTILLÖ World Series Utö
World Series Swimrun Returns in Perfect Conditions on Utö
Press Release / 21.06.2021
Probably one of the strongest starting fields ever really showed that the ÖTILLÖ Swimrun World Series is back!
The front pack raced hard over 17 swims and very technical trail running. For the first third of the race 6 teams stuck together. When the technical trail running sections started the field started to brake apart. Towards the end it was all about two teams. The winning team managed to pull away a little bit on every technical running section to finally be able to cruise the last swim to the finish line with a little more than four (4) minutes to spare.
The island of Utö in the Stockholm Archipelago provided the perfect stage for the start of the 2021 ÖTILLÖ Swimrun season. The perfect weather, with air temperatures in the mid 20 C and with water temperatures just shy of 17 degrees made for perfect swimrun conditions.
The World Series race course was a total of 26,5 km long with 17 swim sections and 18 run sections. This race course is a little shorter than usual to be able to meet the Covid-19 regulations in place in Sweden. To compensate for the shortness of the course it was instead very technical. The trail running sections were more than 80% on technical, single track trails with constant ups and down. The swims, all 17 of them made for lots of transitions between running and swimming where it is easy to lose lots of time. No swim was longer than 500 metres, so very intense.
All in all the World Series race had 123 starting teams of two. Of these a big concentration was of top ranked teams making up for a very stiff competition up front in all three categories. The teams represented a total of 24 nations.
For a big part of the race the front teams powered through nature like a furious unit. Switching in and out and trying to drop the other.
In the Womens race it was equally competitive with three teams pushing hard at the front. With a little less than an hour left of the race the World Champion Desirée Andersson and Anna Hellström (Runner up at the World Champs) pulled away and showed why they are so hard to beat. Behind the third Team Wild West Coast caught up with ARK Swimrun at the end and took clinched the second spot.
In the mixed race ARK Swimrun with Ulrika Eriksson & Peter Oom showed right away that they were going for the win. The battle for second place became very exciting. After a little more than half the race Alexander Koller & Marika Wagner (ARK Swimrun) pulled away and took second ahead of Envol Switzerland (Alexis Charrier & Sabina Rapelli).
It has been a fantastic weekend of Swimrun propaganda where the Saturday Sprint and Experience races had a total of 215 racers enjoying the fantastic Swimrun location that Utö is. In total more than 450 persons have been back racing in Swimrun again.
Hopefully the rest of the season can see more racing!
ÖTILLÖ World Series Utö TOP 3:
MEN
1. Team Öckerö Rörläggeri - Adriel Young AUS & Max Andersson SWE 2:45:15
2. Kraken Swimrun - Pontus Lindberg & George Bjälkemo SWE 2:49:37
3. Team ARK Swimrun1 - Lars Ekman & Fredrik Axegård SWE 2:51:15
MIXED
1. ARK Swimrun - Peter Oom & Ulrika Eriksson SWE - 3:02:47
2. ARK Swimrun - Marika Wagner & Alexander Koller SWE - 3:07:08
3. Team Envol Switzerland - Sabina Rapelli CH & Alexis Charrier FRA - 3:10:05
WOMEN
1. Team Envol - Desirée Andersson & Anna Hellström SWE - 3:15:48
2. Team Wild Swirmrun West Coast - Therese Bergling & Evelina Järvinen SWE - 3:20:57
3. ARK Swimrun - Helena Sivertsson & Kristin Larsson SWE - 3:21:55
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