Lassila cruised to her second Finnish Championships title

FasterSkierApril 5, 2005

Riitta-Liisa Lassila won her career's and season's second Finnish Championships
title in Vuokatti on Saturday on 30 km free tehnique race. Through the race
Lassila had tough battle with silvermedalist Aino-Kaisa Saarinen who ended up
losing the gold by 22,7 seconds. Kaisa Varis took the bronze. Virpi Kuitunen
didn't race due to flu.

Some quotes from top 3:

Lassila: “It is my second gold medal and there is never too many individual
Finnish Championships medals so I value this a lot. Today we had a good tough
battle with Aino-Kaisa, the last uphill was real hard for me. I didn't know the
final results until Aino-Kaisa has crossed the finish line.”

Saarinen: “Free technique hasn't been too strong for me this season but luckily
today I was able to challenge Ritu. It was tough race today and during the last
5 kms, my legs were sore in the uphills and that was hard. As for the whole
season I give grade nine on scale 4-10 – I still have to keep working on my free
technique.”

Varis: “If there hadn't been this championships, I probably hadn't raced at all
this season. This was my main competition this winter. I knew it would be tough
to win a medal and very seldom I have been so exhausted after 30 km race. I
still haven't made decisions about pursuing my career further but it looks a lot
more positive now for my competitive career than it has been during past two
years.”

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Further info and results (all in Finnish)
http://www.sotkamonjymy.fi/sm2005
click “Tulokset” from the main menu, choose either Lauantai (Saturday) or
Sunnuntai (Sunday) to get to daily results.

FasterSkier

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