A Perfect Season Start for Ötillö Swimrun on Utö

Press Release / 12.06.2024

Racing at the Otillo Utö Swimrun / © Jean Marie Gueye / ÖTILLÖ

400 Racers came out to the Island of Utö, the birthplace of Swimrun, in the Stockholm Archipelago to participate in three race distances: World Series, Sprint and Experience. Conditions were ideal for Swimrun with an air temperature of 20 degrees and water temperatures of 11 to 15 degrees.

In the World Series distance, which is also a Qualifier event for the annual ÖTILLÖ Swimrun World Championship, the athletes had to complete a course of 32.4km, split into 20 partly very technical running sections (27km) and 19 swims (5km) around the island of Utö.

Reigning Mens' World Champion Hugo Tormento from France had teamed up with Mixed World Champion Adriel Young from Australia. In a very competitive field in the Mens Category they managed to take an early lead and win the race in a total time of 3:21:24, six minutes ahead of Matthieu Poullin and Tom Ralite from France. They were just 5 seconds ahead of the third placed team of Thomas Deffains and Davis Pesquet, also from France.

Race winner Hugo Tormento said, "It was a very good day. It was fun to race with Adriel, he is so strong and so easy to get along with. Our last race was Malta in 2021, we did not race together since. But it was also an interesting challenge for us because neither of our training was particularly focused on Swimrun in the last few weeks. The competition was strong from the beginning but luckily, we could break away early in the race. The conditions were great. The water was cold but not too cold and with the sun and no wind it was a really nice race."

In the Mixed Category, the Finnish team of Heidi Hyvärinen and Aki Hurula won with a lead of just two minutes over multiple World Champions Kristin Larsson and Daniel Hansson, both from Sweden.

In the Women's Category, serial ÖTILLÖ World Series winners and World Champions Desirée Andersson and Fanny Kuhn, who returned from a baby break, took the win in a time of 4:21:21.

The next race of the ÖTILLÖ Swimrun World Series 2024 will he held in Engadin on June 29th.