Mixtape: Helen Ostet WILD Swimrun

ÖTILLÖ Swimrun Austin is right around the corner, and every year a big crew of WILD Swimrunners, aka the Wildies, shows up in Texas. So for the tenth installment of our Throwback Mixtape series, we hop in the hot tub time machine and go back to April 2025 (originally episode 276) for our conversation with Helen Ostet, one of the co-founders of WILD Swimrun.

WILD Swimrun is a women's swimrun community out of Sweden that gets women and their kids into the sport in a friendly, supportive, judgment-free setting. Helen joined Mia Rönn and Fanny Kuhn as a partner in 2021 after being part of the community from the very start. She is also one of our favorite humans in the sport. Every time we land in Sweden, she shows up with fika.

We talk about how WILD keeps the barrier to entry low with loaner gear, what it takes to get more women into the longer races, the race weekend WILD builds around Utö, and the WILD collab paddle from Frank Paddles. Helen walks us through a WILD camp on Mallorca, from gear day to transition training behind a World Championship podium finisher. She also opens up about three shoulder surgeries and how swimrun changed her life, taking her from a smoker who had never been active to a race volunteer to a co-founder of a community built on kindness.

Before we roll the vault tape, we catch up on what's new with WILD, from multiple Wildies on the ÖTILLÖ World Championship podium this year to The Wild Ones podcast from our friends Viv and Sarah. We also talk about our seventh straight trip to ÖTILLÖ Swimrun Austin. If it's your first swimrun, check the ÖTILLÖ website for the Envol shakeout clinic the day before the race.

00:00 Intro
01:30 Why Helen and WILD Swimrun, right before ÖTILLÖ Swimrun Austin
02:00 Our history with WILD and Wildies on the World Champs podium
04:10 Austin prep, the Envol shakeout clinic, and race number seven
06:05 Into the vault: Helen Ostet joins the show
07:50 What WILD Swimrun is and who it's for
10:00 Loaner gear, backyard swimrun, and every fitness level
11:00 Getting more women into long-distance swimrun
14:00 The WILD race weekend at Utö
17:00 The WILD x Frank Paddles collab paddle
20:15 Inside a WILD camp: Mallorca in May
23:00 Fast transitions and talking to your partner
25:30 Why the WILD community feels like a safe place
30:50 Helen's shoulder surgeries and comeback
32:15 How swimrun changed Helen's life
34:45 Your race can be your world championship
36:30 Helen on the Löw Tide Böyz
38:00 Our WILD Swimrun fundraiser
40:30 Outro

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