Riding the big horse: Storehesten Opp 2015

The only way is up!

Exactly a week after the Skåla Opp 2015 race, yesterday there was the Storehesten Opp 2015 race. Mount Storehesten (The big horse) is in Bygstad, where my parents-in-law come from, and it is very close to where they live now and where Frank grew up; Sande. After Frank got the taste of racing in the beginning of this year, we decided to participate in this race, especially due to the close family connections. The race was initially schedule to go in June, and we even planned our summer holidays according to it, but due to exceptional amounts of snow this year, it was postponed to August.

Storehesten Opp has a very nice concept that allows racing in two different distances. The longest distance is 11 km and has has 1200 meters elevation gain. The first 5 km of this course has 400 meters elevation gain and it is on asphalt and gravel roads. The last 6 km has 800 meters elevation gain and this part is entirely on terrain. This last part makes the second distance of the race. Starters in the racing class in both distances start at exactly the same time, which is pretty cool, because then the shorter distance runners have a chance to get to the top before the longer distance runners and cheer them to finish. Then there is the class of participants whose times are not registered, they also do the short course, and they are the vast majority of participants. I was actually surprised to see how few people participated in the racing classes. In the short distance, where I participated, there were only 16 runners, 11 men and 5 women.

Before the race I was again calculating and trying to estimate my finish time. The long distance running time is comparable to that at Skåla. The winners in both races have more or less the same times, the best time at Storehesten being 4 minutes better than that at Skåla. For the short distance, I again did not know what to expect. Skåla is 8 km long and 1800 meters high, which took me 2h15m. The short course of  Storehesten is 6 km long and only 800 meters high; what to expect? I decided that I would try to go for 1:15. My father-in-law, who likes to tease us, challenged me that I could not do it in less than 1:30, which both worried me and gave me more motivation. Frank, who did 1:55 at Skåla, went for the long course, with the hope to achieve 1:45 this time.

At the start area of the long course, we found several of our Melkesyre and Varegg friends, and after wishing each other good luck, we separated, three of us leaving with the bus to the start area of the short course. I was really surprised that there were so few runners in the short course. After the start, we very quickly became two groups: the men (and one woman whom I did not see at the start) in the front, and four women at the back. As always, I just did my own thing and took it as easy as I thought I could afford from the start. Two girls, in their 20s, were at my back all the time. I was thinking that they had a plan; that they would stay behind my back until some point and then make an attack and leave me behind. I was surprised that they never passed me, and at some points I was quite a bit ahead of them.

Though the weather was warm, it was quite windy, and we had the wind on our backs for a while which was really pleasant. The course is very varied with steep uphill parts consisting of high steps and big rocks, and more level parts, which require running if you want to keep your time down. An amazingly wonderful surprise was all the people who shouted my name and called "Heia Pinar" throughout the entire course. That is the advantage of racing in the home town of your family. Frank's sister, her husband, their children, several childhood friends of Frank and many neighbors, had all started in the no-time class much earlier than us. They had already been to the top and had descended and spread throughout the course to cheer people up. It was simply unbelievable. I could not always look up to see who they were, I just kept waving and waving the best I could. Thank you all so much everybody! It gave such energy and made the whole thing so much fun. Towards the end, though, everything became a lot tougher. The wind, which by then was stronger, hit us in the front and made it really difficult to go on at some points. When there was 1 km left, I had already spent 1 hour, and I was thinking to myself that my father-in-law was perhaps right. There was still 200 meters of elevation gain left, and I knew that the last part is on big rocks which makes it difficult to get a good pace. At that point, I did not care about the time anymore, I just wanted to keep the two girls behind me.

I finished in 1:18, with the girls right behind me, and I became number 2 out of all the ladies that started at the short course. Very happy with that! The course this year was slightly longer, because they changed it to avoid as much snow as possible, and everybody had higher times than normal. So perhaps 1:15 was not a bad estimate after all. The most impressive part, though, was Frank's achievement. He finished in 1:40, 15 minutes faster than at Skåla last week! Very impressed also by our friends' achievements; Hanne and Bjørn Harald winning their classes in the long course, and Frode making a big improvement from Skåla and passing Frank at the very end.

The two girls were so sweet; we gave each other high fives at the finish and we chatted on the way down. It turned out that one of them is a fitness instructor, which made me even more satisfied. When I told them that I was afraid they had a plan staying behind me, they both exclaimed "We did! But it did not work!"

What can I say? De gamle er eldst! :-)