For some it already started on Thursday afternoon with boarding the ferry to Helsinki. Helsinki ferry also means longer sleep in the morning. Which is welcomed by most. Especially on the way back, but more on that later.

After arriving to Finland Friday morning and paving our way through Helsinkis traffic jam, also picking up the training maps on our way, we finally moved in to our accommodation for the weekend. One side of a duplex house on top of the hill inside the town of Borgå/Porvoo.

Soon we went to have a look at this years arena and got ready to train in the most relevant forest close by. It was warm and dry in the forest. But beautiful and quite similar to southern Stockholm area. Many paths from previous people training gave an idea of how it could look in the forest for the later legs in the relay. But as soon as you left those paths, you could also understand that the terrain is more demanding and difficult than those paved up areas made it look.

After a good dinner with well organized food plan and trying to fix the dish washer the first times (it took several tries over the weekend to get it working) we went to sleep to await the next day, while the other club members made their way to Finland with the Friday ferry. Most of them staying later on place in the arena in military tents. As most other participants do. Some even sleep just next to the windshelter, right inside the arena or in front of the big screen while trying to follow the relay.

Venla

Once everybody was on place it was already soon time for the women to start their relay called Venla. It was very warm (around 28 degrees in the shadow) and dry. Luckily our windshelter was placed in a place that had shadow. So runners could avoid the sun for as long as possible before the run. Unfortunatly the first team had to accept a misspunch and a resulting disqualification. Nevertheless there were good performances in all the 4 Venla teams. Results

239th Snättringe ‭SK2 (Lucia Parga, Alva Lidström Lauri, Molly Gelius, Thea Gelius)
333th Snättringe SK3 (Anni Tanskanen, Anna Tedhamre, Caroline Kaipe, Nadja Dahlström)
1002th Snättringe SK4 (Gittan Gelius, Elisabeth Hector, Anna Wolgast, Linnea Gustafsson)
DQ Snättringe SK1 (Frida Hector,  Sofia Persson, Kristina Tedhamre, Mariia Khimochkina)

Jukola

While the women finished their run, most male runners were trying to rest up for the upcoming race during the night or early morning.

Some even got a massage

And as soon as the sun started to set the runners headed out in the the forest at 23:00. Unfortunatly also the mens team 1 and even team 2 had to accept an early misspunch in their Jukola relay. Nevertheless there were good performances by many runners. Especially to mention Simon Hector, who was fastest on his Leg3 (the long night) by more than 2min!

After analysing the results a bit closer (Jukola changed their results service in a way that misspunched teams need to dig in to the data by hand, see attached pdf for an overview of the disqualified teams in Venla and Jukola), it is safe to say that we nevertheless took a step forward again. Even with not perfect runs by many. In the end the 3rd team was best, finishing on position 501. Results

501th Snättringe SK3 (Fredrik Eggöy Markhester, Oskar Ekner, Jörgen Hector, Hampus Hatlen, Fredric Johansson, Yoav Shalev, Johan Lidmar)
DQ Snättringe SK1 (Jesper Lidmar, Mattias Kallhauge, Simon Hector, Flavio Poltéra, Brais Piniero, Isak Gelius, Peleg Mitzafon)
DQ Snättringe SK2 (Oscar Wångberg Aneland, Hannes Lindqvist, Joel Börjesson Eriksson, Stefan Svensson Gelius, Martin Norrbom, John Wolgast, David Hector)

Team Match

As a small side note, we also won the Teams Match against Södertörn. The setup was as follows: OK Södertörn and Snättringe SK had the same amount of teams in Venla (4 Teams) and Jukola (3Teams). Each first team competed against the other first team, each 2nd against the 2nd and so on. The team that places better takes a point for the club. I was as thight as one can imagine, with the 4th Teams in Venla batteling it out, where "Snättringe SK 4" was able to overtake "OK Södertörn 4" on the last leg, finishing 1002 compared to 1005!

After the relay

Soon after the last finish, we already left for the ferry from Helsinki to Stockholm. As usually the way back was used for sharing our own experiences during the weekend with each other, share our plans for the upcoming summer and taking part in the party on the boat, where the welcome longer mornings for the Helsinki ferry comes in to play again.

Picture from Jukolanviesti Instagram (Picture by Sanna Reponen)

I am sure there are many stories to tell that I do not know of, or that would make this article way too long. But I want to specially thank the Team Leaders at the arena, Elisabeth, Jonny and Ludvig, for their support on place during the relays. And also the many people involved in planning the whole trip in detail. As always, it worked out perfect and we could focus on our races only! Thank you, it would not be possible without the work of you all!

Analysis-SSK-Venla-Jukola2023