C2 Stockholm City Challenge 2005 (Nordic Cup)
Night and Day in Stockholm
Staffan Ahltin / 06.10.2005
The Prologue started when, at one minute intervals, the competitors rapelled from the roof. They continued by running at full speed in to The North Face store in the city center and back, then jumped into boats for a short kayaking section, followed by some orienteering around the Island of Djurgården . Not unexpectedly ’Free Adventure’ from Finland , including Petri Forsman, came out first – even though they didn't have that much of a lead.
’The Restless Night’ began with mountain bike orienteering and the start was at the top of Hammarbybacken, with an astonishing view over the city. Now the competition got serious. Navigating became to be the biggest problem for several teams, but the biking in the Nacka Reserve Park was very pretty with a mix of cool single tracks and gravel roads.
Out by Alby in Tyreso the night kayaking started. Some heavy lifts and difficult navigating through the reeds made it really exciting and a lot of teams lost time. A tight cave crawl and another rapell station was an abrupt interruption to the kayaking. The way back through the Nacka Reserve Park was a running course before a switch to inlines on a superb course through Stockholm city centre to Karlberg in the early morning.
The top teams got one hour's worth of sleep before ’The Day After’ started with a tough running stage in Vasastaden and then 9 kilometers of kayaking to get to the Stockholm Globe Arena – the climax of The North Face City Challenge 2005! Free Adventure was still in the lead and Halti passed Team Haglöfs, trying to fight off an ever stronger Ryska Posten/SATS.
On the way back to Karlberg the teams had a tough ride in the rough waters outside The City Hall, Stadshuset. Waves were coming from all angles, bouncing on the kayaks and most teams had great difficulties. Free Adventure managed to keep their lead of 20-24 minutes, but behind them there was a real struggle to win the silver and bronze. Halti managed to stay in second at this stage, 2 minutes ahead of Ryska Posten/SATS and another 2 minutes ahead of Team Haglöfs.
Then the extremely tough bike ride, including the famous obstacle course at Karlberg, took its toll and allowed Ryska Posten/SATS to pass Halti and gain 4 minutes. The last 3,5 kilometer run did not change the order – the Finnish team Free Adventure won, the silver went to Ryska Posten/SATS and the bronze to Halti.
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