Sebastian Samuelsson back after the illness: "It was quite nice"

Toxic in Annecy's mass start - that's how Sebastian Samuelsson went on Christmas break.

Afterwards, he regretted feeling compelled to compete.

- Had I known that I had to withdraw from a competition, I might have thought differently.

But it will be a lesson for the future, when you see that it still doesn't work, said Samuelsson after the race.

After the competition on December 18, the Swede was ill until Christmas.

- I became crass after France.

I thought it would go away pretty quickly, but then I developed a cough that was quite troublesome.

So it was probably a week there without training.

I was also quite cautious before I started, so I think it went pretty well once I got going.

"Pretty fresh"

He admits that the form may have taken a beating, but chooses to look at the positive bits that the absence has brought.

- With hindsight, I feel that it was quite nice to have a few days without training.

Both mentally, but also purely muscularly, I feel quite fresh.

- But I miss the hard passes.

I did a test race on Monday and a threshold session before that.

I don't think the form needs to be that bad.

The men's sprint in Pokljuka starts at 14.00 tomorrow (Friday) and will be broadcast on SVT1 and SVTPlay.