On Wednesday the norwegian team for the forest distances at WOC 2017 in Estonia were selected. I did not get selected, but I am reserve for the Middle and Long distance. I am disappointed, my biggest goal this season was to run a forest disiplin at WOC this year, and most of all I wished to run the long distance, which I have been aiming for, for many seasons now. However, there are still some spots to fight for, the sprint disiplins will be decided in the beginning of next week.
This year's World Cup started last week in Finland, with sprint relay, sprint, middle and long distance chasing start. In the sprint relay I ran the 1st leg for Norway 2, and ran quite well the first part of the race except of 1 routechoice, but lost quite many seconds on the last part, and changed over in the 12th spot 39s behind. In the end the team got DSQ due to a wrong control on the 3rd leg. In the sprint the day after, I ran a very good sprint qualification and got a 10th place there. But in the sprint final, I struggled too much and took two bad routechoices, and ended on a disappointing 21th position. In the middle distance Saturday, I did a stable technical performance, but felt I had to slow down a bit to be able to find the controls, and I did not execute the longer legs well enough loosing time on zigzaging. So a bit rusty in nordic terrain, I was too slow and ended as 32nd. Ahead of the chasing start I was 25th, 5:34min behind. I went out in a big group, but my legs were heavy and I had no chance. Ended as 26th, with 32nd best time.
My performances at the selection races last weekend were good enough to get selected for the World Cup races in Finland next week. I will be running the sprint relay on Wednesday, for Norway team 2. After the sprint relay the World Cup continues with a mini-tour. Thursday there will be sprint qualification and sprint final in Lohja. Saturday we will run a middle distance, and Sunday the tour ends with a chasing start based on the results of the sprint and the middle distance.
