GORE-TEX Footwear Transalpine Race
‘Keep On Running’ – To the End
Fredrik Ölmqvist (Salomon Trail Runners) / 10.09.2006
Latsch. Süd-Tirol, Italy. Sept 9. I’m sitting in the shade on the hotel terrace after having finished the last stage. It feels strange that the race is over. After 230 km running across the Alps I reached the finish line today at noon, together with running partner Juergen Kurapkat, European Manager for Gore-Tex Foot wear.
We started today’s stage at 0800am in the little north-Italian alpine village Schlanders. Instead of starting slow, we pushed up the long first ascent leaving several strong teams behind. The climb on steep mountain trails took us two a little more than two hours. The view from the top was breathtaking. And running on the ridge was absolutely beautiful. After descending the mountain we finished in the Italian village Latsch, after running through the apple groves. In the town square there were a big crowd cheering our arrival of this epic running adventure across the Alps.
For fellow runner Willie Brown from Edinburgh, this was his first multi-day running adventure ever (he had only run 10 km in a race before this event, and agreed to join Neil Rhodes for the race since he promised there would be a beer at the finish line at every stage).
He put his feelings about the stage and the race like this:
“Seven days had past, and the journey had almost come to an end. I had started out on with reservations, wondering if I could complete this race or if my fitness was enough to see me through, especially as I had only had 4 weeks to train for this.�
“Running on the ridge overlooking the two valleys was awesome. I could see the town where we started in the morning and the town where the finish would be. It was difficult to both take in the view and look where you were running, but at this point you just had to slow down to take in the view.�
SleepMonsters
