Topi Raitanen improved his result by a notch, but that did not satisfy the champion runner.
Topi Raitanen’s season has been down. Roni Lehti
Top Raitanen improved his results a little, when the European champion ran in the Joensuu GP competitions as second in the event with a time of 8:27.75. The result was five seconds short of Raitanen’s season best, but was still an improvement compared to the previous two races.
Raitanen still fought for second place at the end of the stretch with the crowd cheering wildly, but the runner was not pleased with the time.
– Little Snap forward, but it doesn’t feel good. Once that bottom was seen, it starts to get better day by day and week by week, Raitanen said after the competition.
Raitanen started the season very strongly, breaking 8:25 twice at the beginning of June. After mid-June, however, the results almost collapsed. Raitanen’s times are no less than around 8:40.
However, Raitanen says that he knows how to improve the results.
– Through rest, and the fact that you can catch up to a familiar training rhythm. There will be fewer competitions in the next month and a half than in the previous corresponding period.
Raitanen’s competition calendar was tight during June. The runner believes that a lighter competition calendar will improve his results towards the end of the season and the World Championships.
– Through familiar training, which includes harder and lighter sleds. For a long time, we went from competition to competition, and in between had time to balance training a bit. Now let’s get into a familiar rhythm.
The competition was won by Morocco Mohammed Tindouft at 8:23,65. Australian Ben Buckingham was behind Raitanen in the final stretch after running only 67 hundredths slower than Raita.