Hardangervidda Crossing North to South (Norway)
Unsupported Solo FKT attempt report by Espen Myklebust
Official Start Time: August 1, 2024 - 04:39
Official End Time: August 1, 2024 - 21:25
Hardangervidda is somewhat of a mythical place in Norway. Being the largest mountain plateau in Northern Europe, most of it is unreachable without serious time and physical commitment. It was the training ground for the great polar explorers, Amundsen and Nansen, before their South and North Pole expeditions and still a playground for outdoor enthusiasts both young and old. My father spent countless hours skiing and running here when he was young.
All this in addition to having done many adventures there myself, has caused Hardangervidda to become a special place for me. As I have gotten more and more serious about my running and learning that there’s an FKT route going all the way from Finse in the north to Haukeliseter in the south, attempting to get it became a significant goal for me.
About one year ago, I had my first go at it. A cold and snowy September day. It seemed promising, but my knee gave out about halfway, and I had to work myself down (word of warning, there is not many chances to get down from the plateau other than by foot or helicopter). It took 24 slow, cold and tiring hours with the occasional hallucination.
I had almost promised myself not to try it again, but as with every ultra race, you forget the hard times and remember the adventure. When a weather window opened I jumped on the train to Finse to give it another go.
I got up early in the morning after a terrible nights sleep. Still, I felt really good as I got ready and for the first few hours.
The start of the route is a little technical with quite rocky terrain. Was able to hold a decent speed and had to remind myself to keep it slow. It’s a long day ahead.
After crossing the last car road going over the plateau, the terrain moves into a big flat and boggy area with quite a lot of mud. Not the most exciting part of the trip, but you can keep a decent speed here.
At around 08:00 other hikers started coming onto the trails. It was a beautiful and sunny day, almost too warm, but with quite a lot of head wind to help cool down. Many of the hikers were puzzled when seeing a guy in running shoes and small running vest zooming through the trails far away from civilisation.
Around the same time, my stomach started acting up. I can usually handle gels really well, but this time around my body didn’t want them. I was still able to continue, although with much pain.
As I got closer to the end, the trail becomes a lot more hilly. After the longest hill of the route my body really hit a low point. I was close to fainting for lack of nutrition and had to sit down. I thought the record was done for and decided to have a rest and meal before continuing. I slowly made my way to the top and ended up deciding to give it one more go. After all I was getting quite close to the end relatively to what I had completed. Down hills and flats felt surprisingly well so I went hard on those and slow on the up hills.
It was an emotional moment once I realised that I would be able to hold it all the way in and started descending the plateau. Even more emotional was once I came over the top of the last steep down hill and saw the parking lot of Haukeliseter mountain hotel where the finish line is. My girlfriend and her mom was there to pick me up and had gathered lots of guests and hotel staff to cheer me in the last few meters.
The trip was hard! I’m really happy to be done and even more happy to finally get the FKT.
Start of run video (Finse):
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/J0Bs0R6idy8
Finish line video (Haukeliseter):
https://www.youtube.com/shorts/u_VgkBnVFGw