Pia Sundstedt

Fuerteventura..

piasundstedt — Thu, 16 Feb 2012 17:56:36 +0000

The name of the island, fuerte viento, means strong winds. There are very strong winds! No wonder that this is a surfer’s paradise. The winds make me suffer on my way back to the hotel. The way out is always easy. I am just rolling and enjoying the sun and enjoying pedaling my road bike. There is hardly any traffic on the roads that makes riding your bike feel pretty safe. Also the car drivers are real role models here, they wait until they can pass the cyclist/cyclists and that feels good. I always thank them by lifting my hand. That way they notice that I am thankful for how they act in the traffic.
I am pretty surprised on how easy it has been to change from cross country skiing to cycling. I feel surprisingly strong and riding for many hours causes no problems. I know it from former years. The first week cycling is really easy. Then I usually overdo it and then I get tired the second week. I have to pay for my motivation At the moment I am doing exactly the same mistake as every year. But its so much fun to ride in the sun after all these weeks in the cold. So maybe next week I have to change into surfing to recover a bit.

Raceday

piasundstedt — Sat, 11 Feb 2012 19:13:42 +0000

The alarm on my mobile phone was set on 04.10am. As always when I know I have to get up I woke up on my own. The clock showed 03.50 when I opened my eyes. I turned on the coffee machine and started to boil water in the water kettle. I mixed 7 Liters of warm sportsdrink. That should be enough for two athletes and 100 km. At 5 am my co-supporter Agnes and Uwe Hardter, Olaf´s friend, were here and off we went to Schonach. This time I was the one driving the car. Thanks to Agnes for the helping hand during the race with mixing bottles, handing out gels and bars to our athletes! It is pure stress to be part of the service crew. Now I know why the service personel is always so tired after a day helping out me. I am dead tired at the moment..
In Schonach we arrived at 6 am. Olaf and Uwe picked up their numbers, weighed their backpacks (has to be 4 kg at the start and 3 kg at the finsh) and went off to test ther skis. All was fine and they went inside the school center, where the race office was for a while to keep warm. I brushed the skis, put one layer more off gripwax. We call that last layer “nerv-layer”, because it is useless, but good for your nerves .
7 Minutes to the start. It was still dark. Agnes+myself left. We wanted to reach the first feedzone at km 4 in time. Be ready to hand out new skipoles, if the guys had managed to break them at the start. We found all the feedzones easily and could hand out drinks and energizers. All went so smooth. Only on Thurner at km 42 I did not have a gel in my pocket. I know how it is when you don’t get what you want. Shit, what a mistake of me. From there it was about 1 hour skiing time to Hinterzarten and there was nowhere we could feed. So I hit the gas pedal and drove to Hinterzarten. Changed my winterboots into my skiingboots, took the bag with food and drinks and started to ski. I met skiers all the time as I was climbing up towards Thurner. At least I could hand out this bloody gel a few km earlier. I was sweating, the sun finally came out and it made such a big difference to the earlier grey and windy weather. As I saw Olaf, he got his gel, squeezed it into his mouth and just continued the downhill. I had to double pole really hard to keep up with him. I had not waxed my skis and his skis worked perfectly at that time. As we came closer to Hinterzarten at km 60 of the race, there was a sign saying that the finish line will be in Hinterzarten – for everyone. On top of Feldberg, which was further on the way, it was apparently very windy.
There were many skiers who were disapointed, also Olaf and Uwe. They both wanted to do the 100 km. I was also disaponted because the plan was that I would do the last 40 km with them and carry the food and drinks.
There is a time limit of 5,5 hours in Hinterzarten and the 60km for those who want to do the 100 km. That is quite a tough limit and you really have to keep on going a steady and hard pace if you want to make it. So therefore it was a surprise that they stopped the race. The weather was fantastic in Hinterzarten with -10 degrees and blue sky. We know Feldberg and we know that the wind can be very hard on you, but the people who make it to Hinterzarten within the time limit are in good shape. They would have made the windy part on top of Fedberg as well. We talk about only 15-20 minutes exposed to heavy winds on open terrain before you are on the windshelterd part of Feldberg. I am pretty sure that the open fields in the first part of the race were much colder than it would have been on Feldberg. The sun was shining at that time.
The wind came from the eastern direction and the track goes from east to west, so tailwind for athe athletes. In France, they did the famous “Transjurassienne” race today. Over there, it was -20 degrees and the track goes from west to east. The start was delayed a bit, because the track had to be prepared during the race. It was so windy that the machines had to remake the course 15-20 minutes before the first skiers. Otherwise there would have been no track. Imagine skiing against the wind! That s so cold! The Backpackskiers in Black forest were lucky having a tailwind today. So the decision to stop the race, well let us say, was disapointing.
Anyway, hat off to everybody doing the race. Skiing in Black forest is very hard. It is only climbing and tricky downhills all the time. I think in the entire 60km course today, maybe 1 km was really flat.
Next on the schedule is my training camp in Fuerteventura from Monday onwards. I usually combine skiing with more and more cycling from end of February onwards, but with the forecast at the moment, I cannot see any rideable conditions here in the near future.

Rucksacklauf

piasundstedt — Fri, 10 Feb 2012 19:47:49 +0000

Rucksacklauf, translated you could call it backpack cross country skiing race. It is a race starting in Schonach and finishing on Belchen. We are crossing part of Black forest from the north towards the south. The race distance is 100km and total climbing about 2500 meters. Classical style. Nothing for weak ones. Tomorrow morning the start will happen at 7 am. I won’t be participating, but Olaf will. This time I am the one who has to take care of the feeding. It has been a super busy day. This morning we did test the skis. Afterwards I waxed them and I hope they will be working well tomorrow. Waxing skis is by the way worse than science. There are no clear rules. It is all about testing and finding out the right wax-formula.Even after testing several days you still don’t know what is the best wax. Our friend and my personal supporter and helper Agnes will join us tomorrow morning. From km 58-100 I am supposed to ski with Olaf and feed him. I am so to say the water carrier. The only thing he has to do is make it to Hinterzarten within the time limit of 5,5 hours. If I haven’t done a terrible mistake waxing the skis he should make it. The weather is supposed to be cold with temperatures between -10–17 with a cold wind from the east. The sun should be shining though and that makes a big difference. Looking forward to a day in Black forest. Now off to bed, wake up is 4 am…Good night!

It is cold, but I like it!

piasundstedt — Sat, 04 Feb 2012 16:07:18 +0000

In the morning the quicksilver is showing about -12 degrees Celsius in Freiburg. To that you should add another -5 degrees Celsius and you will have the morning temperature for Black forest.
When the sun is rising the quicksilver is falling down a few more degrees. That is how it is, for a few moments as the sun is rising it is getting colder until the sun starts to warm up the air a little bit. The sun is already quite powerful. Well, no wonder we already have February.

The last couple of days I have really been enjoying great skiing tracks. I have now done the whole www.fernskiwanderweg.de track. It is a 100km long track from Schonach to Belchen. We did not do it in one single day, we split it up in 3 stages. Yesterday the last stage from Notschrei to Belchen was done.
Our friend and my colleague Uwe Hardter joined us on this last part. He really made me suffer as we were kind of racing up the last long climb on our way back to Notschrei. My arms were really at their limit, since my skis had no super grip anymore. Such a good feeling to be on the top as your whole body was dead tired.
Today we spent again some hours on the skiing tracks in Thurner-Hinterzarten-Titisee-Waldau area. If I can trust the weather forecast it should stay cold. I hope so! Still 700km to go until I have reached my 2000km mark.

The best way to start the day

piasundstedt — Wed, 01 Feb 2012 12:37:35 +0000

is to do some sports. Yesterday in the news they were telling that the Siberian winter would reach Central Europe. For me Siberian winter means -35 degrees Celsius and sports activities inside. Here in Germany Siberian winter is -10–15 degrees Celsius. Wonderful, I thought after watching the news. Finally some perfect winter weather.

At 8 am I was on notschrei-loipe.de. The car measured -12 degrees outside temperature. I started to skate and I felt good breathing in the cold air, hear the skis glide on the snow and just enjoy the early morning silence.

Kepli Sports Gala

piasundstedt — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 18:15:41 +0000

Last night the athlete of the year in Central Ostrobothnia was awarded, by kepli.fi (Central Ostrobothnian Sports Federation).
I was awarded as “the woman athlete of the year”.

My father was representing me at the sports gala. He was the best person to do that. When I was 14 years old and started to compeete in cycling he was the one to drive me around the whole country to different races. My mother was cooking and made the food ready just to heat up. Everything was so well organized and they did all this for me.

A part of this award belongs to my parents. Without their support I would have never reached what I have reached in sports until now. Thank you mum and dad!

Finlandssvenska Bragdmedaljen

piasundstedt — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 18:50:01 +0000

I have been nominated for „ Finlandssvenska bragdmedaljen 2011“. Every year there are three candidates nominated. The other two candidates for the medal is boxer Robert Helenius and a ski orienteerer Staffan Tunis. Both of them have been very successful in their own sports.
Bragdmedaljen is yearly given to an athlete who is part of the Swedish speaking Sports society. To all no-Finns it might be worth mentioning that Finland is a bilingual country and therefore also a sports federation called Finlands Svenska Idrottsförbund.
On 4^th of February the winner of Bragdmedaljen 2011 will be announced. You can vote for your candidate under this link

My favourite training at the moment

piasundstedt — Thu, 12 Jan 2012 15:08:40 +0000

Olympic year

piasundstedt — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 06:21:54 +0000

Almost 12 years ago I was in Sydney. Where did all theese years go? A lot has happened during all theese years. I finished my road career, I finished my studies in political science at Åbo Akademi University, and I started a new cycling career. This time focusing on mtb marathons.
I competed seven years on the road. At the moment I have seven years of mountainbiking behind me. I never get bored. I still love training as much as I did 20 years ago. There is not one single day that I have to force myself to go out and do my work out.
The new year is motivating me an inch more. It is an Olympic year. The biggest dream for every athlete is to take part at the Olympics. I have never been in London. My goal is to be there end of July and beginning of August.

Before my dream will come true there is some work to be done and especially some racing. As you know mountainbiking won’t be the discipline I am aiming for. It is road racing.
I am currently on the 85th position in the world ranking. 31st of May is the deadline and on that particular day I have to be among the 100 first athletes.
Springtime for me means participating in road races. I have updated my race calender. So if you click on “calender” you will find it. It is still a preliminary version and the exact schedule will be decided later as the season starts roling

2011 in review

piasundstedt — Sun, 01 Jan 2012 06:47:11 +0000

The WordPress.com stats helper monkeys prepared a 2011 annual report for this blog.

Here’s an excerpt:

The concert hall at the Syndey Opera House holds 2,700 people. This blog was viewed about 13,000 times in 2011. If it were a concert at Sydney Opera House, it would take about 5 sold-out performances for that many people to see it.

Click here to see the complete report.