Back in the day, Estonian Inline Skating Cup used to gather several hundred participants in each of the distances. Skaters from Lithuania also participated here on regular base. Unfortunately, well known recent events have significantly changed the geography of inline skating marathons and influenced the number of athletes. However, the tradition remains to live, and the first stage of Estonian Inline Skating Cup 2023, which took place on May 6 in Viljandi, became the first competition this year for the LT STRIDE team from Vilnius.
Although the calendar has already shows May, the weather conditions did not spoil the team: the snow has fallen night before, while the morning was greeted with a temperature of only 7C, wind and gusts. Moreover, the surface of the track was rough in places, and the width was comfortable also not everywhere. However, when you are at the start line, you do not care about weather: there are 7 laps 6 km each in front of you, 50 competitors next to you and the same number of 21 km runners, who will start 2 minutes later, and you will have to overtake them several times in the distance, behind you.
Highly variable pace, unexpectedly many sprints and breakaways, tactical fights and exhausting rivalry did their job: LT STRIDE stayed in the pack for a couple of laps, but then separated up in different groups. The outcome was corresponding: 14th (01:17:07), 17th (01:20:40), 23rd and 24th places (both 01:22:09). The World Cup participant Reinis Znotinš from Latvia became the confident winner, taking 1 hour 13 minutes and 52 seconds on the track. That is almost a minute ahead of the Estonian racer Andrus Kuus (01:14:50), as well as his teammate Lauris Bitenieks (01:16:44), who was third on the podium.
Right, the positions at finish line are below of our expectations, seems like LT STRIDE by themselves were a little disappointed too. But the main task of the first race was to improve team tactics and communication, while the places and pace were noted as secondary. A truly unsuccessful competition would only be if the team did not learn anything here. Therefore, we will evaluate the outcome of the first stage of the Estonian Inline Skating Cup later this season.
