It ain´t over ´til it's over.
That´s what Bernd said on the plane, after we had almost missed the flight to
Stockholm, in a different life, a long
time ago. I remembered that all the
time and that's why I continued swimming. Otherwise I would have wanted to stop
after 50m. Just get on one of the boats. But I didn't.
But let´s start at the beginning: it is 5:00h on Aug. 11th 2018, somewhere middle of nowhere, about 10
km outside of Åre, Sweden. Accompanied by westerly winds at about 18m/s,
the first edition of Swedeman Xtreme Triathlon goes off with a running start.
Without having been in the water before to try and get used to it. Heading off west, against the wind. And against the waves, which are almost half a
meter high... I struggle from the beginning, unable to find a rhythm. I can´t find
into breathing, I am close to panic. But close is only close. Remember what
Bernd said... Finally, after 2km of breaststroke swimming in order not to
drown, things get better. At the end of the 3.8 km, at the exit under Tännforsen,
Sweden's largest waterfall, I had been out there for almost 2 hours. The first
half hour gone and out of schedule…
I don't feel well at all on the
bike. It's cold, wet, the swim still makes me feel sick. But then, after a very short
while, things change completely. Two left turns later, the heavy westerly wind,
that nearly drowned me some minutes ago, now pushes me to high speed. Well, not
too bad, this could go on for a while… Only 60 km further, after the course
turned left into the jämtlandic back country, things get tough again when the
wind tries to blow the front wheel out of direction on high-speed descents. But
that´s someting you can get used to.
The course leads through undulating primal landscape, from tiny village to
even tinier village. It is a bit longer than usual, 206 km, with 1.800m
elevation. I go quite fast actually, for my standards, with 30km/h average up
to km 120. If, oh if, we would not have to get back to Åre some time. What does
tailwind do on your way back? Exactly! Riding 40 km straight against the wind
on the E14 on a Saturday afternoon in August... I don't recommend this to
anyone. At the end of the bike leg, when my average speed has decreased to 25
km/h and I discover that the last Kilometer before reaching T2 has a 10% gradient, the
fun-level instantly falls back to zero.
Thank goodness I still have my tireless support crew who permanently keep cheering
and chasing me out of the transition zone after picking up the compulsary
mountain kit (backpack, raincoat, -trousers, 2 sets of warm clothes, gloves,
cap, whistle, food, drink), out on the run course. Well, if it only had been
one...
The trail winds through the forest, over wooden bridges, across the moor, up
to the first summit. After 7 km I find myself at 1,100 m and above the
tree line. Somewhere deep in my heart I had already been in doubt for quite a
while, if I'd really be able to make the cut-off at km 31, I´d have to be there at
20:00h. It began right after leaving the transition-zone, meanwhile I´m as slow as over 10
min/km. At 17:30h I have only done 10 km, somewhere in the middle of
nowhere, between the summit, the moor and the first checkpoint. But what should
I say, Bernd said something about it, years ago, on the plane to Stockholm.
So, further forward, no matter
how slow.
At the Fröå checkpoint at km 19, Lukas joins my lonely run. 50 minutes up
to cut-off, hopeless, they crew say. But you know what Bernd said! Besides, we're from Eastern
Westphalia, we keep going just because we´re too stubborn to quit. Deep
in the forest we get a call from Marlene, who is also part of the support crew:
Cut-off has been extended by half an hour. Oh, wow. Cool, if we only had known this before...
Nevermind. I brace up, trying to give all that I´ve got and start running. For quite
a while I had only been doing some kind of speed-hiking. The brain had no
longer been in control, the bike course had taken a lot more than I had thought.
I remember this last bit as endless, about a hundred times we see some
villages among the trees, which aren´t more than just a house, a hundred times
we swear and run on. At last, we meet Marlene who accompanies us on the
last kilometer to the Huså checkpoint. That is, the last kilometer for me,
because here, half an hour later than the extended cut-off, after 16:00 hours
and 214 km, the journey ends. Unfinished, but ended. Because as Bernd said on
the plane to Stockholm, it ain´t over
´til it's over. But that also means:
when it's over, it IS over.
My first DNF in a race (except Bergen 2010, where I did not even get
further than the first swim meters) hurts. Just because it was such an
unnecessarily harsh cut-off that knocked me out. Even more, because the
conditions were so hard. And most of all, because the information about the extra
time extension came much too late.
But, what should I say, meanwhile
we made peace, Swedeman and me. I will be back.´
And it won´t be over ´til it´s
over then.
