The Arctic KIMM
The Arctic KIMM - How a New Race Began
Per Sjögren / 27.02.2005
We are a group of dedicated mountain runners from Sweden who, for many years, have travelled to the now legendary Karrimor Mountain Marathon (KIMM), held every year at the end of October in the UK.
In 2003 four teams that travelled to Langholm. We had a couple of great days in the mountains and, as is our tradition, concluded our time at a country house hotel. After a hot bath and a fantastic dinner we rounded off the evening with a whisky in front of the fire… and then we started to wonder if we could arrange a KIMM in Sweden? Some of us already had lots of experience from arranging the Björkliden Arctic Marathon as well as orienteering races. Both the creativity and the whisky flowed and soon we had come up with the basic idea:
“Let’s arrange an Arctic KIMM, an annual race that takes place close to the Arctic Circle. The race could be held from Iceland in the west to Russia in the east.� Everyone thought this was a great idea.
When we got home we contacted Mike Parsons of KIMM straight away, and he liked the idea too. After several very intensive weeks we’d sorted everything out. The competition area was to be Hemavan.
New maps were quickly organised and the marketing manager for Högfjällshotellet, Sam Hedman, was right behind us - when everything came to a dead halt. The local Sámis were totally opposed to the project because we were aiming for the race to take place in July 2004. July turned out to be a month that is very sensitive for reindeer herding. We had innumerable meetings and endless discussions, but in April we gave up.
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