If I could summarize an
entire weekend in a sentence to spare you the trouble of reading a
long race report I would. But I can't.
You see, there is so
much to write about that I don't know where to start. The 11-hour
long car trip from Skellefteå to Mora that could have been boring
but wasn't. The atmosphere at the legendary Vasaloppet finish line.
The struggle to keep going when I ran my part of the race. The
Saturday night laugh-till-you-drop hi-jinx. The bittersweet aftertaste
of coming home at the end of an amazing weekend.
So be warned. This is a
long read.
Vasastafetten is a
relay race from Sälen to Mora, on a 90 km long track that is better
known for the Vasaloppet cross-country ski race. Skellefteå AIK
running club entered the race this year with 3 teams – two
all-female teams and one all-male one. Each team consists of 10
runners that have to run different parts of the course, on varying
terrain. Some run on forest roads, others on single track, and some
have to even cross bogs.
Our three teams drove
down in four mini-buses. Spirits were high despite the fact that we
set off just after 6 in the morning. There was never a dull moment in
our bus. We somehow ended up competing with the all-male team bus
about who would reach Mora first. Unfortunately the passengers in
that bus made use of very questionable and decidedly unsportsmanlike
methods to make sure they won. For example, they removed the hub-cap
from one of our wheels. If they hadn't done that, I am sure we would
have gotten to Mora first.
Once there and settled
in our three-bed rooms, we headed out to get some dinner at the
Vasaloppet party tent by the finish line. I had arranged to meet up
with an old running buddy from Gothenburg there, who was to run the
ultra version of the race. That is, while we others ran like we were
being chased by a rabid Tyrannosaurus with a chainsaw in its hands
(paws?) for a relatively short time, the ultra runners would be
making their way along the same track but most of them at a more
leisurely pace and for a most likely much longer time. Say, 15 hours
or so (like some of the rear-of-the-packers I saw walking resolutely
towards the finish line at 8 in the evening, hours after our team had
crossed it).
It was strange to meet
up with a friend from my Gothenburg days, especially in the company
of my new, Skellefteå friends. Gothenburg is a city that I still
love, and I have many great memories from the 8 years we lived there.
Seeing my friend (and a couple of other dear Gothenburg friends who
came to visit earlier this summer) brought back a lot of these
memories and triggered an almost overwhelming longing to visit my old
stomping grounds. At the same time, I was among amazing, funny, kind
people, all of whom I've met the last couple of years in my new home.
I felt lucky to have these people around me. Still, a trip to
Gothenburg has been long overdue.
Later that evening, the
three teams gathered in a meeting room by the hotel reception to talk
logistics. My brain was mush by that point, overloaded by faces,
places and information. Very little new information found its way in.
I turned in not long after, completely certain that, exhausted as I
was, I would fall asleep immediately. Instead, I lay awake for what
felt like hours. I slept in intervals and woke up early, more tired
than the night before.
After a prolonged
breakfast, we got ready and made our way to our buses. Each person
was dropped off at their station. I waited with the two other SAIK
runners who would be running our 4,7 km part of the race from Läde
to Eldris at a place that seemed to have jumped out of the pages of a
story book. Log houses, flowers, green fields and spruce forests
covered partly by brush strokes of mist were steadily getting hit
first by a light drizzle and then by pouring rain. We stood there in
our rain coats and trousers as ultra runners, among others my old
friend, jogged past us. It would be our turn to run soon.
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| Läde |
In my mind I was like a
tight spring, full of pent-up energy. I had doubts as to my ability
to reach my goal of 21 minutes. I had missed way too much training
because of my runner's knee. My body, on the other hand, was quite
relaxed. I was too tired to be wound-up.
Still, when my teammate
showed up and handed me the chip, my tiredness melted away. I felt
confident and took off in long, powerful strides up the first upward
slope. A long downward slope followed, and I let gravity carry me at
a speed far greater than I was used to. By the time I had run 2 km, I
was struggling.
I was a diver running
out of breath, swimming up to the surface only to find it blocked by
ice. An astronaut on the surface of the moon with an empty tank. I
tried to breathe and send oxygen to my muscles, but none existed. I
slowed down but it didn't seem to help. I felt bad. So bad that I
considered slowing down even further to a walk, but I was too
stubborn for my own good and went on. I tried not to slip on the mud
that covered the forest road I ran on, and to avoid as many of the
meter-wide water puddles that stretched across my path. Rain drops
forced themselves under my contact lenses and blurred my vision, but
I could still see I was running past others. I was running past ultra-runners at least. And boy did I envy their leisurely pace.
At last. The finish
line was in sight, my teammate was waiting for me to send the chip
over the table separating her section of the course from mine and the
rain had let up a little. I wished my teammate luck almost
breathlessly and leaned over the fence to catch my breath. Then it
was time to get to the minibus that was waiting for me at the parking
lot as soon as possible. The ones of us who had already run would try
to make it to the finish line in time to run past it together with
the last teammate.
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| In our fathers' footsteps for future victories |
To run under the
legendary sign at the finish line in Mora was humbling,
awe-inspiring. We entered the track as our teammate ran past and ran
with her the last hundred meters or so, cheering her on as she
finished strong. Our team efforts had granted us a seventh place out
of 53 all-female teams. I later found out that I had run the second
best time on my part of the course. My near-death experience had not
been for nothing.
Of course we were not
the only ones with a great result. The all-male team ended up in 11th
place among over a hundred teams, and the other all-female team got
themselves the 21st spot. No other running club had
managed to put together more than two teams, but we had: three
amazing teams. I am so proud to call each and every one of these
people my club mates.
Needless to say,
celebrations were in order. We started off by eating at the hotel
restaurant, which served a luxurious buffet, and then we went for
drinks at a pub in town.
If you think that the
sorest muscles in my body on Sunday morning were my leg muscles, you
are wrong. My stomach muscles were the ones that hurt the most. It
must have been from all the laughing on Saturday night. Unfortunately
they did not get to rest. The long trip back home awaited us, a tired
bunch of runners and friends, already looking forward to next year's
race.
