Dont even know where to start…Louise and I have been up to Kiruna (extremely north Sweden) and tried to winter climb Kebnekaise, Swedens least lowest summit. I have started sailing Hobie Cats again, I am paddling kayaks around town, I have raced in an outrigger canoe with Pelle, and we are planning our summer holydays….

Here som pics, and more stories will follow.

1 month ago: spring in Oman, visiting my dad….I love Oman.

3 weeks ago: spring in Kiruna, on the way up to Kebnekaise

Camp at Kebnekaise

My Outrigger Canoe friends.

Lo and I at Pia’s Hobie center. Just came in from a nice low wind training round in the good ol Hobie 18

Two months ago, paddling at Lake BodenSee in Germany. Swiss Alps in the distance. Huge roadtrip for work.

More pictures klick here!

Somewhere halfway, note the awesome sunshine, no hat, rolled up sleeves, rolled down rowing suit, and grin on face…

Imagine, the London tube at 07:30 in the morning. Kind of crowded and stressfull right?… Ok, now add to that, that everyone has 210cm long feet and a 160cm long finger on their hand. After having spent saturday wondering around in Mora and enjoying the rather funny atmosphere I felt pretty well prepared for it. Even though my 130km’s or what ever it was of training that I had in my legs probably is about 1000km’s to little I felt super ready. Peter at Ski-Go had taken care of my skies. Now this guys is seriously enthusiastic about ski wax. I think he eats it for breakfast. With heap of tender loving care he had applied layer after layer of the finest stuff in the business. My skies were in paradise. When he got them back he tried to tell me in one breath what he had applied on them, but he failed. It took at least 10minutes for him to talk me through the layers of violet glue, base glue, a bit of kick wax silver, soem powder here and some fluor there. The conditions were extremely challenging for the ski waxers. Wet, frozen, warm, fake snow, real snow, ice, blueberry soup. I also got some ski poles that were longer, lighter, and way cooler than the aluminium rodds that I have be working with before. The Power Bar guys dropped me of at the start (a 90minute drive). I thougt I would be early with being there at 06:45. But no. There was at least a kilometer of people allready lined up in the tracks. I took an other que. The one in front of the battery of porta potties. After having eaten about a kg of porridge with mashed bananas in the car this was definately more important for me than getting in the starting zone.
I looked att the guys at the back of the pack, and thought…no. I can not stand there. So I skid to about halfway the que and sort of jumped a fence and mingled in with my skies. Roughly 2500 people in front of me. Great. Not that I think of myself as a fast skier. But I just can not help to think that I should be slightly better trained than most them. A loud hooter went of and a buzz went through the dark, coldish, air. A few minutes later the crowed started moving. As a tube train that reached its fina platform. I imediately felt that my skies had the most awesome grip I ever experienced. They were also sliding rather good. This start has nothing to do with racing. A 3year old on a tricycle would be faster. Than after 500mtres comes the ironic thing. A really steep, really narrow, and really long uphill. I was a bit worried for this as tough upphils usually are really tiresome for me with skiing due to my total lack of technique. But not this time. The crowed moved up the hill in a snails pace. My grip was so amazing that I was not even using my poles. Just slowly walked up. I tried a few ‘Ur spår’ but mostly just in a bad attempt to be funny. After 15km’s or so I had passed a lot of people and the tracks were getting less crowded. Then came the first checkpoint. I threw a few cups of hot Powerbar drink in my mouth and staked of again. 400meters after the checkpoint I suddenly felt my right pole was weird. I looked down and to my horror I noticed the cage (point) was gone. Fuck!

I immediatly stopped my stopwatch as I felt that I did not want this to tune me down. I ran back to the checkpoint where the service center was so kind to get me a new pair of poles. Not half as light, long and sexy as what I had before but I was happy! 10minutes later or so I was of again. The minutes I lost barganing new poles were not the worst. No, it was far worse seeing the thousands of people that flowed by. I knew I had to overtake every single one of them…again. Due to the conditions 2 tracks had become rather fast (icy) and 2 were ridiculously slow. Some weird mixture of new snow, heat and whatever made that people would just not go there. I had no choice. Get in the slow, but more important, empty track and hammer it. It was to slow to stake, so I opted for using my superior grip and just worked hard with the legs. Slowly working my way past the solid line of happy skieers. Every now and than I had to jump back in the fast gliding track and rest a bit. 10km’s later things lightened up. Finaly. From then on it was just a breeze. Great fun. The KM’s ticking by. I sort of knew however it would not last. 25km’s to go. One of the coolest things with these long races I think is the interaction between the brain and the body. In rowing this interaction is also there, but it is no good. It is only bad news you are getting from both the body and the brain, and you somehow have to just forget about both. That is good for 7minutes. Not for 6hours. Spread out over the body are sensors. They send a little signal, and then the brain processes that info and does something with it. It is so simple but really cool. For instance. Staking along like mad. BEEP BEEP: minor kramp in right tricep, end of message. Ok, thanks. I need to drink. Where? Now? Later? no now. Later might be to late. 3 hours left you. BEEP BEEP: left shoe feeling loose. OK, shoe lace loose?, binding broken? Stop and check?, no look on downhill section and monitor for more serious signals in short time. WOW…mood change. add sugar, add sugar. Fixed. That kind of stuff.
25km’s to go. Getting pretty knackered. The tracks suddenly turn into a wet missrable mess. Progress is definately slowing down and it is getting damn hard to stake. By now I only spot a skieer with a number bib every now and then. Kind of boring. 8km’s to go. The track are gone. It is either ice with 5cm of water on top (better) or a white porridge of icy snow (horrible). My shoes were filled with water and weighed a ton each. I had allready crashed 3 times in queit short interval and I was wondering why. The last time I got some cramp in my stumach muscle while scrambling back on my feet. Luckily I as only going slow. Just clumsy.
I looked at my stop watch as the 8km sign crawled by. 5:28.00 Ooh no. 32 minutes left to get a nice 6hour finish time. I dont know why I wanted that. It is probably a leftover from erg tests.
4minutes per km. That is doable for me in good konditions. Now it is a race, I decided and I should stop beeing a bloody tourist. EXACTLY 4minutes later the next km sign came by. I was doing everything I could to get my skies to go though the dirty snow as fast a possible. Unfortunaly no more downhills were waiting. I had to work hard for every meter. Ironically I exactly managed to keep to the 4minute tempo meaning I just had to continue trying. 1km to go. Unfortunately this last km has two very small climbs. On the little downhills I had to push in order to move. The snow was not fast. Then finally the last 500m straight throught the village into the FINISH. I was staking like a maniak and threw an eye on my watch. Nope…not going to make that.
I heard the speaker say, aah 5023. Paul from Solna, an international rower, and ooh, he is Dutch. Well he is certainly staking eagerly to the finish..will he be back next year?…I gave them a big thumbs up..meaning ‘U bet!’ My watch stopped at 6.00.58 I grinned att it. Funny. The drops of blood dripping out of my nose onto the snow slush between my feet gave this yourney an even more epic spice.
Well that was that. I just have to thank the familly ‘Jens and Bodil’ where I camped out and who’m have been so extremely hospital. Erik, Björn, Sten, Ingrid and Peter who’m all have been so kind with getting my kit in order and giving me positive vibes. They all had to work with the event, and I felt a slight yealousness.
I think with this result I sort have possibility to get a better starting possition in the actual race next year. With some more training it would be good fun to do it again.
I hope Lassie and Sten are up for some training weekends where I could learn how to actually do this. I must be doing so much wrong if I see skinny looking dudes just stake in front of me…and no way I can catch up with them…untill a nice upphill came.

Over and out.

Ok, when I moved to Sweden 6 years ago I figured that the only way to sort of become like a local was to do the Vasaloppet. A 90km cross country ski race in Dalarna. I bought ski’s and even roller skis as I figured I was about down 25 years of XC ski experience. I started rolling around on Djurgården and soon had holes, burn marks and war scars all over. No fear. I was going to be more Swedish than Gustav himself.

Winter came. Running, skiing, biking and doing whatever outside just as normal. I did not have a job (we did not) in those days and we thought to save serious cash by not having our electric heaters on. Dumb move. Together with all the training in the cold (not uesd to) and an average bedroom temp of about 8°C disastrous colds and dripping nozes were bound to happen. So come Vasaloppet I was sick as hell. Louise, being a real Swede, was ok and staked here way along the 90km forest trail. I supported here on bike which in hindsight seemed worse than the actual race. Having since then put most of my efforts into rowing, and having established a more hate/hate relationship with mr winter Vasaloppet ambitions slipped away.
2 weeks ago they suddenly re-appeared though. Dont ask me why. Henke and I had talked about it, but Henke has been coughing and sneezing for the last weeks.
Anyway, I have trained 150km km’s two weekends ago, so I must be super fit right???..
Up to yesterday nothing was arranged. Nobody wanted to go with me. The race is sold out.
Things looking grim.

BUT a breakthrough. Sten, my buddy who never lets me down when it comes to supplying me with Powerbars and all called his brother, and this morning a starting number, some brand new ski poles from SKI GO and a bed in Mora were ready!

I just bought a bus ticket to get me there and back. My return bus is at 17:30 so I better get my ass to Mora before that time.

A great thing is that Peter from SKI GO is helping me out with prepping the damn skis.

The conditions seem te be awefull, and I think it is going te be Klister. MEaning some tacky kind of glue that should glue me to the mountain. No iddear how this works, so better leave it to the pro’s.

Super thanks to Erik and Sten for the help!

Oh yeah, I have had some pain in my left achilles now for long time. It is just manageble and when warm I dont really feel it. But thinking, ‘ok now comes this long ski thing, I better start doing something about it’ I started with some excercise. I heared that excentric excersizes on calves are good for the achilles. So after last weeks cirquits I stood on a bench and worked my calves for 10 minutes. Calv muscles beeing the only muscle (well nearly at least) not used while rowing are hugely underdevelopped on my vehicle of life. The result is a pain in my calf that makes me limp like an old bastard. Yesterday I ran home from work and did 5 tough hill climbs on Haga backen. This morning I had to crawl to the toilet. Great! One could say, yeah but your right leg is ok isnt it?….No it isnt.
There I have a hole in my heel. Last weeks hill running with Ruari on the frozen hill gave me probs. I was using me damn Icebugs (spike shoes) which I though were runn in. But no. After 5,5 intervalls I had to take them off and witness a bloody mess at the rear end of my right hoove.

So double thanks for the folks helping a: Dutch, half cripple, allready blistered, over weight rower with this effort.

Morning of the final…

Louise was jumping around and really nervous for her race. So was I. While Louise was out racing I was restlessly running around on the beach, half looking for ergometers, half checking out the other single rowers and making in good time in interval sprints to the mens room.
Louise came in an hour later and was furious. She totally trusted her GPS after the start and discovered after 2km’s of rowing that she was more than 200 meters of course. The poor thing was trailing way last from then on. Being used to stare at the GPS for more than 2200km’s last summer during her around Sweden trip she kept her trust in the little plastic box. But the difference was that on that trip the were no bouys laid by not so accurate french officials to round.
Louise came in, and I went out. I quickly warmed up and noticed it was nice rowable water. I saw that the start line was crowded at the high end and Peter was lying right there. After the qualification races Peter and I were favourites. But I had a feeling there were some French guys making a plot for a surprise. I had a great start, but after a few strokes one guy that I had overtaken cut across and pushed my stern around. A few hard bangs, my oar bending on his bow, my best french, and I was of again.
When I looked up I saw Peter was struggling to. A felt sorry for him cause he was taking more time to get on again. Focus on rowing was the mantra…many long hard strokes. Boat speed! Feeling. Yep,..I still have it. Soon I was overtaking guys and after 1000m I felt people were weakening. Apart from one bastard that mentioned to have gotten away at least 50 meters. Forget, him! Just make sure I keep following him, stay aligned with the boats behind me and focus. We rounded the second bouy with 3 boats together. WOW, this is racing. But even though the speed was high, I felt under controll. The next stretch was 2700mtrs and I needed to get to business here. So I pushed and got in front. But now I had to steer. I had to stop and look for that damn bouy a few times. Erik and I were steaming along! He tried to push past me and I answered. I noticed he was working. But so was I. And always the waves ans swell to work with as well… a sort of new third dimention. Bouy 3. I turned maybe 2 meters in front and directly managed to get a good surf! I pushed on! This was the plan! But as I was leading I had no clue where bouy 4 was. Must confess that my focus was on getting surf and max boat speed. I managed to get at least to big swells of lead. This was great! When I was comfortable about my lead I started focussing on where the bouy was… when I finally found out where it was I had to adjust a lot! Shit, Erik was right on track!We rounded the bouy together. To be honest here I thought we had 900mtrs to go. But it was only 400. So I start winding it up a bit and take a small lead on him. I still felt strong so I trusted my sprint. I hindsight, If I had known it only was 400mtrs left I would have gone crazy directly after the bouy. Anyway, we were rampaging along. Along side, were some ridicilously large spectator and photographer boats.

Taking the lead…but, allready here I was starting to understand what was going to happen…a big boat taking over…

These guys were putting down such huge swells in all directions that the rowing in rate 36 was rather scarry. Erik got ahead a bit. I went for my super sprint and directly felt I was passing him again, but than these 1,5 meter boat wave came diagonallu from behind and actually stopped me from rowing for a few strokes, my boat twisting at least 30 degrees of course. I adjusted and sprinted on, catching up again! The sames moment I thought I passed him, Erik stopped rowing…we crossed the line.

Scrambling back onto the beach still wondering if I made it or not..

One hour later and many french judges in confusing discussions it was decided that I won silver. The guy who sponsored us with the Eurodiffusion boats actually saw my name as winner on a list, but that appearantly had changed.

Anyy way, real good fun, lots of sun, sand and surf! TOTALLY MY CUP OF TEA…

Nope…did not make it…silver medal. (a nice one at least)

Start list have been made available. All info on www.worldrowing.com Results will be there live as well!

So here we go:

The nearest goal (coming weekend) is the Swedish National Championship in rowing.
I have for the time being said farewell to the single and I will be rowing different crew boats.
The biggest challange will be in the double scull. Henrik and me. Henke putt me in the stroke seat wich makes it really exciting. Having rowed the good part of 4000km in the single this season I can assure you that it is not so easy to adjust to the faster moving crew boats. Also to set a rythm that is easy to follow and enhance for the guys behind you is a challange. We have only perhaps been out 5 times or so and it really did not feel naturally good from the start. Henke had a hard time finding my rythm, and I had a hard time putting down a good accelerating stroke. Two days ago we went out in the pitch dark….autumn is coming and steeling our daylight here…
Taking away the sense of vision, we were totally dependant on feeling. WAUW! And what a feeling. We finally got the boat to move a sweet as can be, and even the quick bursts were working great! Probably our fastest competitor will be Lassi and his coach Pliggen. They have won this event now for many years in a row. Walle and I tried to stop their winning streak two years ago, but fel a few seconds short. Lassi is stronger and faster now…som am I, I am definately rowing a lot better now. Pliggen, I have spotted on the erg during our world cups etc, so I guess he is in pretty good shape. Henke, ..well he is Henke..it does not matter in which shape he is…winning is the only existing thing in his mind.
Than there is the quad. Me again in stroke seat. This is eaven more difficult. Add to this also the fact that I’m steering the 12meter long boat with my right foot, trying to put down a solid stroking rythm that the three guys (Henke, Walle and David) can build on. We were out last night again in the dark and it seems to work. It is far from good yet,…but come race day it will be fine. The cool thing is, that even though these races are pretty much the opposite in lets say the world cups were I really feel the pressure anyway. Knowing that the performance of the entire crew is more or less dependant on me is a cool feeling. Its obviously the same in the singe…I do bad, the boat wont move. But than the consequences are only for me,..now its for the entire crew. Be it 2, 4 or 8! Yepp.. I’m in the 8 as well. Here am, thank god, in the no.4 seat, meaning my mission is easy. Just haul as hard as I can. Unfortunately for the other competing crews, I have to say after our last few sessions doing speedwork in up to 1000m pieces and rating 38 that we are an extremely fine moving machine! Good fun!

Next goal:
Coastal Rowing World Championships in Cannes.
This sounds pretentious, but it is only for club teams. It is how ever the biggest coastal rowing race in the world and it is the official Worlds. I will row the 16km coarse outside the harbour of Cannes in the Single. REALLY looking forward to that! Louise will also row the single as it seems and the girls will also have a crew boat!

After that:
A further away goal, lets say summer 2009, will be to paddle the Molokai crossing in Hawai. A 70km Surfski race between two islands. I guess, this is the ultimate macho thing right up there with the Iron Man competition it must be the coolest thing in the world. 5meter swell, hard winds (mostly from behind) and a 40cm wide open kayak…running down the slopes of water doing 35km/h is something that I guess is more than addictive…
A long way to go though. I have competed in such a race one in Cape Town, and I have to say, I really got a lot of respect for the dudes doing this on a daily basis…during the countless unvoluntary swimms I really was not to comfy with the shark rumours etc. The 9° warm waters werent really making things easy as my shorts and tanktop were not giving that much warmth.

Ok, so that is a little update of what is happening now. Further I am working hard at Point65 again and we will be heading for our anuall most important fair in Nurnburg next week…yeehaa,..1700km with the trailer. But it will be worth it as we usually do great business there.

C ya!

Paul