Admittedly, national team colleague Sara Hector was on the giant slalom podium, and in the World Cup in Cortina, the Swedish team took a silver medal.
But at the same time it is impossible to get away from:
Last year’s season, without an injured Anna Swenn-Larsson, was a winter in the shadows for Swedish alpine skiing – with only one top-three placement in the World Cup.
– Anna Swenn-Larsson is the locomotive in the Swedish women’s slalom – the star was missing last year after covid-19 and ankle fracture.
Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
One by one, the veterans have finished: Maria Pietilä Holmner and Frida Hansdotter, André Myhrer, Mattias Hargin and Matts Olsson, and before this year’s season also the slalom specialist Emelie Wikström.
When a now full Swenn-Larsson begins the Olympic season with this weekend’s premiere in Levi, it’s like the slalom ladies’ locomotive.
It has given birth to new ideas about sparring.
– I have always had Maria and Frida, and also Emelie, who I have hunted, says the 30-year-old.
– Now there are many talented girls from below, so my God … but I do not feel that I have hunted anyone so far this autumn. It has been more those who chased me and then it is a little difficult to know how good I am.
– So I have stated that I want to go with a few other countries, and we will try to get it. Just to be challenged in a different way.
It’s a sloppy one morning in Åre when we meet, still a couple of weeks before Saturday’s World Cup start.
Anna Swenn-Larsson shows up in a pair of bright yellow rubber boots on the hill where she won World Cup silver 2019.
A tough gym session later – together with cohabitant and giant slalom skier Mattias Rönngren, and also Sara Hector – we cross between pools of water to the ski couple’s new farm, a couple of minutes drive from the national arena.
– During the rehab of the ankle injury, Anna Swenn-Larsson decided: “I will return strong.”
Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
Swenn-Larsson and Rönngren shows around among the red-painted houses: the garage, full of ski equipment, which the slalom star has longed for over the years in an apartment, the shelter that Mattias will renovate, the porch railing by the slope that gave way so scary this summer, and inside the house the old fireplace and medal collection.
Here, Anna Swenn-Larsson felt the urge for skiing during months of rehab training last winter – and it was from here that she followed the competitors from the TV couch.
– It was damn boring to sit at home and check, but at the same time also good that I felt that way, she says.
– The first week after the injury I did not train at all. But then I felt like “now fuck, now I drive”. I had a physiotherapist who I ran with every day, twice a day. So I had very good support, just decided that “now I will return strong”. I’m not going to go back and be a little “halved”.
–
– image 1 of 2 Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
–
–
– image 2 of 2 Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
–
–
–
Last year’s season was one serial of setbacks for Sweden’s best slalom skiers.
First, the whole women’s team got stuck in quarantined in Levi after a trainer tested positive for covid-19. Then Anna Swenn-Larsson was affected himself of the disease to then break the ankle during a workout in Italy before Christmas, miss the whole season and the World Cup.
In fact, she has not competed since February 2020. In the last World Cup competition before the pandemic, she was in a clear lead in the second race in Kranjska Gora, went towards the career’s first World Cup victory but drove just before the finish line.
– There are many of my goals that I have left to achieve and one is to be at the top one day, so of course it is a carrot, says Swenn-Larsson about that incident in Slovenia.
– I have definitely looked at the ride I had there, it was still the best I have performed. But at the same time, everything is constantly evolving and people are getting better and better, so you just have to try to keep up.
– Together with cohabitant Mattias Rönngren, Anna Swenn-Larsson has charged for the new season – the Olympic season – which now begins in Levi.
Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
When she skied again in the spring, the operated foot hurt in every turn. Now, already Olympic-ready Anna Swenn-Larsson can ride without pain.
– Most days I do not even think that I have a foot that has been injured, she says.
– I can run, I jump, I have done all the fitness tests. My leg has healed.
How much revenge do you have after the choppy last year?
– I am very eager to get into the hot air again and to compete. I have not really missed that much skiing, I went all last autumn and then from February to May this year. So I do not feel that I am behind. But then I have not competed in almost two years, so it is clear that there will be butterflies.
– Anna Swenn-Larsson has several second places, now she wants to be at the top of the podium.
Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
2020 she stopped femma in the slalom cup after never being worse than just five in the competitions she took down. In the 2019 World Cup season, she was cup four.
In Pyeongchang 2018, where Frida Hansdotter won the Olympic gold, Swenn-Larsson was third after the first race but finished in fifth place.
She will come to Beijing in February in another seat.
On the one hand, the injury has made her physically stronger. The many workouts in the gym have even made her think about the Swedish Championships in indoor rowing, says Swenn-Larsson and laughs.
– I’m stronger than I’ve ever been.
On the one hand, she has a completely different competition routine today.
– I have probably never been so nervous before a second run as in the Olympics in Pyeongchang. Now I have been in that situation several times, now I still feel more prepared.
At the same time, she has become better at handling pressure, she continues. It may be needed as the national team’s front figure.
– I think I felt more pressure when I was younger.
– Now I know that I do everything I can and always my best. And I can not do more.
– Anna Swenn-Larsson took World Cup silver in 2019. Here a couple of days before second place during training in Vemdalen.
Photo: Jonas Lindkvist
Before the doubles the slalom competitions this weekend, she has in recent weeks been at training camp in northern Sweden, but also test-driven the “race slope” in Levi, together with, among others, Sara Hector.
When the giant slalom skier Hector shifts focus to slalom, there is the sparring she “maybe missed a bit” in the Swedish team as well. At the same time, the Swedes in Finland have also trained with Slovenian skiers.
In October became it is also a pass with the alpine world’s largest for Anna Swenn-Larsson.
– I trained with Mikaela Shiffrin (USA) one day in Saas-Fee, she asked if I wanted to drive with her. But we did not drive on time so it was a bit of a shame, says Anna Swenn-Larsson and starts laughing:
– We got there with my serviceman and a coach – for me it’s great. She came there with her service, two coaches, physio, doctor, mother…
Still a good measure of value?
– Exactly. It was inspiring. It was my first camp on snow but I still think it felt like I was hanging out.