Have you heard of Ötillö?

People have been asking me for a few months what my plans are for this year. I’ve had to hum and ha, because I knew what I wanted to do, but didn’t know if I would be able to do it.

Ötillö is the SwimRun World Championship held in the Stockholm archipelago. In a team of two, you start on one island at the top and make your way across over 20 more, swimming between them and running across them until you get to the end!

This is the 10 year anniversary. The race is hugely popular and over-subscribed. There are three ways to get in:

1. Qualify in one of four set races

2. Selection by merits

3. Random draw

After I set my heart on this race, the first challenge was finding someone willing and able to do it with me! Just two weeks before the closing date, I hooked up with Izzy. Perfect! She is in the same club as me and we are very similar ability. At Celtman we finished within 4 minutes of each other.

The next challenge was making our merit application. As well as listing our top race results from the past two years, we had 500 characters to convince the organisers to give us one of only 6 merit spots for female pairs 😕 .

Tension built in the run up to the announcements. We heard that there were more than four applicants for each space. Then we were told the merit selections would be made two days early. On Wednesday morning I was in a state of high tension as I checked down the list as soon as it was published. Would we be judged good enough? Were we the sort of team they were looking for to be a part of this race?

Past the male pairs, onto female, past race qualifying listings, onto merits. Not there, not there, then … last on the list, there were our names!!  I leapt out of my chair and ran down the office making excited squeaking noises 😀 .

More about the race, why I wanted to do it and tales from our build up to come. But for now, here’s our team description:

We first met at a cold, grey lakeside. We jumped in. As the wind whipped up waves we swam another lap. In 2012 only 9 women did Celtman Extreme. We were 2nd and 3rd. Izzy took a year off and created a business inspiring others to get outside and make the most of life. One tough race wasn’t enough for Rosemary who hasn’t stopped since. UK SwimRun interest is booming. We want to experience the original and tell everyone about it! 220triathlon.com will report on our race. The journey is calling.