Who was the first person you told the news to about being selected for the World orienteering Championships?
CT:  "Probably my family, or one of my flatmates if they were about. It wasn’t too big a surprise, but I was still happy and relieved!"

What made you choose orienteering over any of the other available sports?
CT:  "When I was growing up there weren’t many opportunities where I lived, but we did go orienteering on most weekends. So it was a natural choice when I’d been running in the forest from such a young age. I liked that there was a different challenge in every course I ran."

Where is your favourite place to orienteer?

CT:  "Since a couple of weeks ago my new favourite is Idre, in Sweden but near the Norwegian border. Amazing wild and difficult forest!"

What is your favourite training session?

CT:  "Orienteering intervals. Alone or head to head, really good physical training as well as a technique session."

How are you preparing for the World Championships in August?

CT:  "At the time of writing I’m in Latvia on a week-long camp. It’s my second camp here and I’m getting comfortable in this kind of terrain now. I think it’s absolutely vital to have these preparation camps in relevant terrain. After this, I have a couple of weeks at home in Stockholm to put the finishing touches on my preparation before returning for the races. I’m trying to time my training right to achieve a performance “peak” on the right days and weeks, which still feels like more of an art than an exact science!"

Who or what will be your biggest threat?

CT:  "My aim is to run the best races I can on the day. That means being focused on my own performance and not on external factors. However, although orienteering is quite simple, on a big day it’s easy to try too hard and overcomplicate it. That’s probably the main reason you see top runners make mistakes at WOC. So I’d say my biggest threat is potentially from myself, and so my job now is to make sure that I prepare in a way that gets me to the start line in the best frame of mind to succeed."

Thank you, Cat. Congratulations again on being selected to compete in the World Orienteering Championships.

We wish you all the best with the rest of your preparation!