Sophia Lubiecki Represented Team GB for International Modern Pentathlon in Poland

Sophia Lubiecki recounts the eventful experience:

'During the Christmas Vacation, I represented Great Britain at an International Modern Pentathlon competition in Drzonkòw, Poland. The conditions were less than optimal with temperatures below freezing on everyday, moving the entire competition indoors. On arrival the horse riding was the first event. The horse I drew, to the amusement of everyone else, was called Lucyfer. I was informed by someone on the polish national team that I should just try enjoy the ride… Lucyfer turned out to be scared of all the posters on the wall but amazingly honest when jumping fences, with some not so brilliant lines on my part and given his fear of the posters. We made it around the course with just a few time penalties and a pole down. The fencing was the next day, it was fascinating analysing the different styles and attitudes of the other fencers depending on where they came from. Everyone was really friendly and the Czech coach helped me fix my only working blade despite the language barrier. For the swim, the pool was absolutely freezing given the electricity cuts due to the war, I swam surprisingly well, winning my heat. The final event was the combined event (a shoot and run event similar to a winter biathlon) in the new 5x 600 m format with 4 shoot cycles. It was tough as it was all indoors and the air was incredibly dry, but they also had accurate shooting feedback on laptops for close performance analysis. All meals were provided, they were always a mysterious combination of some kind of meat, soup and potatoes but actually tasted really good and the portion sizes definitely kept me going.

Overall, I finished within the top ten and met some amazing people, who I had previously only seen compete on TV and I look forward to seeing them at the next competition.'

Well done, Sophia!