Sweden
I took up triathlon very late and only started around 15-16years of age. Before then I was a “horse girl” who liked sport. I biked to the stable because it fast faster than taking the bus and ran sometimes just to stay fit and healthy. My first couple of triathlons was very much like an adventure more than competitive sport, I couldn’t swim freestyle and breaststroked my way through the 400m…
The years following swimming was going to be my biggest challenge. Not just to learn to swim freestyle, but to do so enough to stay with a front pack at the highest level of the sport.
I spent some time in Australia following my graduation and got to know the sport of triathlon through Spot Anderson in Sydney. I then went to Swansea to train at the British High Performance Centre and the best British girls. As they closed down for internationals prior to the Beijing Olympic Games I ended up joining Darren Smiths’ squad then based in Switzerland.
Darren ended up being a very important person for my career, not only polishing me as an athlete but also teaching me how to be a professional. In the years to come we had a huge amount of success, preparing to big races and being ready when it matters seemed to be what Darren did best in his coaching.
2012 was out best year where we were 9 thousands of a second away from the Olympic Gold medal. A few weeks later I won the first ever WTS in Sweden, Stockholm in front of a massive home crown. I won a big money race in Des Moines the weekend after then the WTS in Yokohama shortly. To finish off the year I ended up winning the WTS Series after a few nerve-wracking hours in Auckland. I ended up with for poisoning the night before the race and spent most of the night and morning in hospital. Somehow I managed to find enough strength to finish the race in 4th which was enough points for the Overall series.
