Had a blast at my last Cross Country of the season. A small national team consisting of me, Matthias Wengelin in Elite and Axel Lind as U23, together with Hjalmar Bengtsson as staff, was invited to come over and race.

It was all a great experience to go to China and race for the fist time. We arrived on thursday afternoon, then they closed the streets for us to roll through the city on friday morning, what a crazy feeling! Then off to the course inspection, again through the city of Guiyang with police escort. It was a bit too warm for my liking with temps around 35 dgr. The course was very intensive but good fun. This course and race site ( including the road to the race site) had been built only for this race last year.and it was hot hell. Felt pretty good and did 4 laps with Emil L and F Giger. The saturday we rolled down to the race site and we all joined the opening ceremony with each of the 38 nations represented. 10 mins after that, we were called up to do a short race. 28 mins + lap at a 2.20 min lap. It was tight and hard racing and I manged to get 4th, after being a bit stuck behind swiss Nicola Rohrbach during the last lap. So Emil and Giger slipped away and got 1st and 2nd, with Rohrbach 3rd. Wengelin got 6 th.

Sunday was XC time. It was even hotter and I really felt affacted by the heat. I got an OK start from 3rd row but I couldn´t push at all the first 3 laps and was lying around 10 th. Missed a bottle as well. (Not good in 35 dgr). Then I found my rhythm a bit and advanced up to 7th in the end. So definitely not a good race, but 7th is ok. Some UCI points and € at least..

After the race the was a good roof top party at the 5-star hotel that we were staying at. We all had a awesome time:-)

We left on monday for Beijing and had a chance to check that out a bit, crazy big city with some cool shopping. Early tuesday morning before the flight we took a trip to see the Great Chinese Wall in Badaling, an hour from the airport. Amazing to see!

Now my mtb season is over and off season/cross training season is starting. That means gym, running and probably some cyclo cross. Me like!

I have some super exciting plans for the upcoming season and year. Stay tuned ;-)

My first WC since the WC final in Schladming 2009 went really well! It was great to be back at the world cup scene and see so many old friends and also awesome that so many swedes(and norwegians of course) were out there and cheered on us in Hafjell!

Even though I felt quite sick the days before and didn´t think I was gonna feel good enough to start I somehow managed to not get sicker and made it to the start. I knew I had good shape before this cold, and been training well the last 2 weeks so it could well work.  Since I only have my UCI points from the Swedish XC Champs this year I was called up as nr 65 out of 81 starters. I didn´t really know what to expect and decided not to stress too much the first lap. Just try to get out of the traffic jam and then start to move up through the field. Once the gun went off things went as expected and I had great legs. Was up around position 25 after 4 laps(half race) but then I felt weakened (in a different way than the normal race pain:-) and had to step off a bit to not blow up. But I held my pace pretty good and got 28th in the end. So I´m happy with that! Makes me wonder what I´ve could of done if I was 100% ?:-)

The other swedes in Men Elite XC did an amazing job with Matthias Wengelin on 6th and Emil on 11th! With me on 28th, I don´t know if there´s ever been 3 swedes in top 30 in a WC?

Had a blast with the national team the whole weekend anyhow!

Next up is the invitational MTB race in Guiyang in China. Me, Emil Lindgren, Matthias Wengelin & U23 Axel Lindh + coach Hjalmar Bengtsson is going there as the national team. Never been to China…:)

Here are a couple pics. Me jackin´it and one with me and old buddie, swiss ace Florian Vogel out spinning..

5th at the Birkebeinerrittet marathon in Norway. Didn´t have the best of legs and had to let Fredrik Ericsson, Magnus Darvell, and 2 norwegians go after 60 kms. But I still managed to hold on for 5th. So so day performance wise but otherwise a great weekend together with the Enervit people, who supported us before, during and after the race . Great atmosphere among the 27 000 riders competing in different categories through out the whole weekend. Thanks for all support. I´ll be back to win next year:-) 

Now I´ll take it easy a couple of days before preparing for the last big race of the season, the XC World Cup final in Hafjäll, Norway in 2 weeks.

Pics of me and Magnus Darvell(2nd)  after the finish and me with Fredrik Ericsson who won. Then the top 5 atthe podium!

Rock on/Calle