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Competitive Skiing
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"I have entered a number of cross-country ski races. The most notable of these was on March 1969 in Finland. This is the famous 90 km 'Pirkan Hiihto'." Story follows:
PIRKAN HIIHTO
By Bill Osgood
During the greater part of 1968 – 1969 I was living with my family in Orivesi, Finland while on sabbatical leave from my position as Librarian of Goddard College in Plainfield, Vermont. Much of the attraction of living in Finland, for me, at least, was their extended winters with plenty of opportunities for skiing. I am a lifelong enthusiast of cross country skiing so I was in a Promised Land. Orivesi is about the same size as Shelburne and quite closely surrounded by extensive woodlands, interlaced with a huge network of trails maintained by the municipality for hiking in the summer and skiing in winter. We arrived in Orivesi in early August, so I had plenty of opportunity to explore most of the trail system and to decide which ones might be best for ski touring. By mid-December there was enough snow so I could burn a coat of pine tar onto the skis and sample the trails where I found that I had plenty of company. Ski touring is a Finnish national pastime as universally popular there as sauna.
As the winter progressed I found that I was making many new Finnish friends, both at work and at play, and the one friend that figures most prominently in this story is Jukka Isola. He and his wife, Eliisa, lived in a small cottage right at the edge of the forest and I often met them out on the ski trails. One day he asked me, “Why don’t we sign up for Pirkan Hiihto?” By that time I knew that Pirkan Hiihto was the premier ski race in Finland and, at that time, the longest ski race in the world at 90 km., or about the same distance as between Shelburne and Barre. By then, the longest distance I had ever skied in one day was 30 km. Most days I only skied five or six. Moreover, I had never seriously considered myself as a racer. So I said to Jukka, “You must be joking. This is way beyond anything I have ever done before.”
Jukka hadn’t dropped the subject, however. One day after an especially exhilarating ski run, we were enjoying a scorching hot sauna at his place. As we cooled off on the porch we tossed back a couple of stiff drinks of schnapps and Jukka said, “You know, the deadline for signing up for Pirkan Hiihto is coming up soon. How about it, will you join me?” And I replied, “Absolutely – I’m with you all the way.” Such is the power of sauna and schnapps taken in tandem! ! The next day we signed on the dotted line and the die was cast. In the days remaining before the race, we huffed and puffed our way around the Orivesi trails in more serious training practice, but at no time did we ever get anywhere near that magic number of 90 km.
Pirkan Hiihto is almost a national holiday in Finland. Over ten thousand skiers from all over the country converge on the little village of Ninisalo in mid-March to test their mettle over the grueling 90 km. race course. The logistics of this operation involve several thousand more people ranging all the way from course checkers to cooks – all of them volunteers. Since the race starts well before sunrise, it is imperative that all the contestants be at Ninisalo the night before. Arranging accommodations for all those people is a real challenge. Some sleep in army tents, others in schoolrooms. Every possible option is used. Our busload from Orivesi was assigned to space in a school gymnasium along with several hundred other skiers from all over Finland. Since Finland has such a small population, many of the skiers at Ninisalo already knew each other either from previous events, or from races in other parts of the country. It was a giant family reunion. Jukka made sure that I got properly introduced. As we compared notes, I learned that this year, in 1969, I was the only American entered in this event. Moreover, it was my 43rd birthday. Just before we got on the bus at Orivesi, Thelma gave me my birthday present; a handsome handmade double-knit sweater in gray, black, and red yarn.
Everyone was wired on the eve of the race. Adrenaline was the major item on the evening menu in addition to hearty helpings of sausage and potatoes. While we were eating, the volunteers had kindled hundreds of small fires throughout the encampment. The main purpose of the fires was to provide heat to burn an extra coat of pine tar onto the skis, but the blaze also provided the opportunity to sing a few rousing ski songs before turning in. I used my new sweater as a pillow on the hard gymnasium floor and, truthfully, I didn’t sleep much that night; neither did many of my companions. So we were mostly wide-awake at the morning call for a bowl of porridge.
Perhaps the major logistical challenge of the race was getting ten thousand skiiers into the starting lineup long before sunrise on the day of the race. We all had numbered bibs. Mine was 1285. Then, of course, there were several classes, ranging from top-seeded skiers in the front ranks to those of little experience like myself way in the rear. By some form of exquisite magic we were all in place at the time the starting gun boomed at seven. All the skiers were arranged in columns on fifty parallel tracks over a wide, snowy plain. All of us, with one voice, shouted a loud “Hurrah” and we were off. Slowly at first, but gradually picking up speed just as a locomotive pulls out of the station. Since it was still pitch dark, the tracks were illuminated by torches set in the snow alongside. It was surely a ghostly experience with only the hiss of those thousands of skis on the well-tracked snow – not another sound. We were all focussed on that finish line 90 km. away.
The first part of the race was over gently rolling terrain which gave us a mistaken feeling of confidence. I thought to myself, “This is a piece of cake.” But as we all know such moments of hubris are soon followed by reality. Mine came when we started some real hill climbing. I worked up such a head of steam that my glasses got completely fogged over so I had to step out of the stream of skiers and put them in a trouser pocket. Alas, I had chosen a pocket with a hole in it, so no sooner did I get underway again but the glasses slipped down around my ankle. I had to get out of the track again to partially undress to recover those glasses again and put them in the pocket without a hole. Meanwhile, hundreds of skiers had passed my by and my chances of finishing the race in a decent time had completely disappeared. Moreover, my nearsighted condition made it exceptionally difficult to see the track clearly. I had to slow way down to avoid any serious tumbles and that put me even further behind. By the time I reached the first rest stop, I seriously considered dropping out of the race. However a big mug of steaming lingonberry juice at the rest stop recharged my enthusiasm. But by now, I didn’t have much companionship on the trail. Jukka was somewhere far ahead of me along with most of the other ten thousand skiers. The other rest stops in the race were only a blur, but I was determined to cross that finish line. I kept repeating to myself, “I will keep skiing; I will keep skiing . . . “ I suppose I had learned a little of what Finns call, “Sisu” which roughly translates into the will to persist in something, no matter what the odds. And it must have been “Sisu” which gave me that burst of energy to dash the last few hundred yards over the finish line some four hours after the number one man had crossed the line.
There were several perks for finishing the race. One is a bronze medallion which I keep as a treasured memento. Another was the opportunity to have a brief but refreshing sauna before climbing aboard busses for our homeward journey. It was good to see Jukka and my other Orivesi companions and to greet my family back in town. But the story isn’t quite finished. Thelma found that the birthday sweater that she had so lovingly knit for me was a ruin. The top half had become totally felted because of the sweat and heat I generated during the race. In true Yankee custom she used the top half to make a teapot cozy and re-knit the bottom half into a smaller size for her sister. The Pirkan Hiihto sweater lives on.
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