Riina Kuuselo: Season summary and future prospects

Summarising the season it was difficult and not what I expected but still one of the bests in a way since I gained my best ever World Cup placing, being 6th in the World Cup long distance in Spain. That’s much more than I could have dreamed about in January when suffering from a pelvic fracture and unable to do anything. What I regret most is that I was again the first to drop out from the WOC team and didn’t get to run the race I had prepared for for a whole year. I really would have loved to get that chance. To EOC I got a last minute call and placed twice in top 20 there. I had aimed higher but didn’t have much left after WC and qualifications. After only two months of training 6 races in 10 days was just a bit too much at once. In Venla relay we climbed back to the podium placing 2nd after the flying Danes. That was perhaps the biggest highlight of the year and something I will always remember. It was very special since it was probably my last Venla with the wonderful Punahilkka team (girls’ team in Tampereen Pyrintö). About 10 years ago all former stars left Pyrintö and we were only a few girls left in the club. But we kept training hard, supporting one another, and built this amazing new team, that was able to win Venla in 2010 and Tiomila in 2011. Today, the group is much bigger and has several competitive teams. I will miss them all, not only the first team, but the whole bunch of them. There are always more runners behind a successful team than those standing on the podium. But since I’m living now more or less permanently in Sweden, it’s time for a change and new challenges.

What comes to my future plans (ta da, now comes the big news…), next year I will be running for OK Linné and competing mostly in Sweden. And hopefully in Scotland too! After spending three years in UK, heather covered hills and moors feel like my playground. But Swedish Champs in Stockholm will be another great target and challenge to me. I’ve still got a lot of work to do in order to master that kind of detailed terrain but I’m really looking forward to all technical training that I can do here in order to improve my rusted orienteering skills. Getting a few things right can mean minutes off from your race time. The training milieu in OK Linné is fantastic and I’m really looking forward to get fully integrated to it. Tisdagsbanan has already started and the Winter training première is just around the corner. Tisdags...what? Tisdagsbanan. It's a well-known concept in Linné, a special form of winter training since time immemorial (read Cat's wonderful description of it here). Winter Training Première on the other hand is a serious start of winter training, described as a ritual ceremony with epic proportions. We also had a small kick-off for the season in a form of Tiomila training camp a few weeks ago. It was a great weekend with plentiful high quality O sessions.

I also want to acknowledge other local clubs who have warmly welcomed me to their trainings and helped with various things. You have made me feel like home here. Tack!

And obviously I want to thank Pyrintö and all wonderful people there who have been there for me all these years! You will always have a special place in my heart. I still get tears in my eyes when I think back everything.

Some flashbacks from the time in Pyrintö...