From Russia with love - kind of

Last weekend we were racing in St. Petersburg at FEI international CEI class. Organizer was Russian equestrian club "Istok".

Traveling went quite smoothly and crossing the border did not have any major issues. Few problems with forms and other travelers having issues ahead of us took some time and total crossing time was 5 hours in and 5 hours out. If everything would go well and all forms would be perfectly filled it could only take about 2 hours in and 2 hours out. Traveling in Russia was good as the main roads were in very good condition and fuel was really cheap. Cheap and fast driving.

The racing area wasn't that great. Organizer lacked experience and didn't have much ready for the race. Lot of problems with the competition area, boxes, route markings, route safety, water supply and schedule. We managed to get our horse to box in few hours and did get our gear to place. After that we went to get few hours of rest in our hotel. Early at morning we starter racing but partly due to dangerous track and unfortunate events the horse fell during the course during second phase and shocked horse wasn't able to continue.

Sadly no result but still lot of experience! Traveling long distance (34 hours total travel time), complicated border crossings and racing in extreme heat (over 32C) is very demanding for the horse and for the crew. The flaws in the event organizing was however the most demanding part. Without these problems by the organizer and the horse falling the trip would have been perfect.

Klaipeda, Baltic Cup and this week

Race at Klaipeda was the last race of Baltic Cup for sidecars. Places 4th and 2nd gave 2nd overall for the day and for the Baltic Cup! We are quite happy for our total 2nd place but of course 2nd isn't the first.

There is still 2 races in Korvikunnid Cup and we are only few points behind the first place but also third is only few points behind us. We do consider Korvikunnid Cup to be our main cup so we are really working to get that first place overall.

This saturday we are racing at Tihemetsa with quad and solos and this sunday at Jõgeva with quad and sidecar. For sidecar the race is only practice race but it just might give us the edge for the future races.

Today it is time to train with solo and quad to get ready for the weekend.

Pühajoe and Klaipeda

Weekend's race at Pühajoe went well. We were able to get 4th and 5th place in our class. We were only mere seconds from 3rd and 4th place.

Next friday morning we are going to head to Klaipeda Lithuania. Long trip (over 600km) so we need to travel early. We have high hopes for the race.

Klaipeda MX track is at 55.69536,21.350779 coordinates.

Bad luck at Vilaka but moving forward

We had technical problems at Vilaka that resulted two heats with no results. However both days gave one heat with decent result and lot of good training.

But we are moving forward. Today we are going to Pärnu Kolmapäevakross race, next saturday to Pühajoe TOP200 race and sunday to training for the next week's saturday race at Klaipeda Lithuania. So this week is still full of action!

UPDATE - 3. JULY

In addition to all this trouble our utility van didn't start anymore with broken start engine. Now it is towed to repair shop and we are hoping to get it back soon. Sadly we missed Pärnu Kolmapäevakross because of this.