Arctic Spine Race 2025
Rob Brooks
I’m lying face down in the snow …. again.
This time it is not deep snow, I am not trapped by my pulk and it is not -30 degrees.
It is however my pulk that is the cause of my current predicament. And it’s not the first time I’ve been in this situation in the race, I’ve fallen down maybe 100 times. Its death by a thousand pulk hits.
Pre-race excitement
I’m back in Sweden to once again take on the Arctic Spine, 293 miles on the Kungsleden trail, this time over 9.5 days.
After the usual epic journey of a taxi, 2 flights a delayed train and wrangling a stupid amount of luggage I arrived in Abisko around 1pm. It was around -10 degrees which felt ok and I took the opportunity to have a quick blast on the skis before a walk to the nearby shop to top up my supplies (the shop in the SFT is small and quite limited, but abound a mile and a half down the road in Abisko Ost there is a much larger supermarket).
Then it was time for dinner and catching up with some old faces and meeting some new ones. It was great to see Joe, Barclay, Caroline and Alex who were all returning from last year.
I was bunked with Barclay, Les, Kiera and Rianne (before she decided Les snoring was too much and departed for another room). Barclay did the race last year but sadly retired just after hut 1 with frostbite. We’d spent quite a bit of time in the intervening year conversing and swapping race strategies and lessons learned.
Les is a larger than life character, the life and soul of the party. He has a wealth of experience from serving in the army where he was blown up and lost the sight in one eye, and lots of high-level mountaineering including scaling Everest at the third attempt and saving a woman’s life on his first, sacrificing his own attempt.
Kiera is a local Sami, living in Jokkmokk. He knew the area well and I anticipated he’d do well in the race. The following 2 days were pretty miserable with temps up to 6 degrees and drizzly rain which stripped out a lot of snow and what remained was transformed into sheet ice. Much faffing was performed and the obligatory assessment day and kit check went by without issue.
Race day
Because of the icy conditions our pulks were transported a few hundred yards down the route to a less precarious section. After the obligatory pre-race photo we held a minute silence for Charlie Watkins. Charlie was one of the pioneers from last year competing in a team with Eoin and Caroline and had sadly passed away just a few weeks after the race from a rare brain condition. I only knew Charlie for a short time, but he was a warm friendly lad and he will be sorely missed.
We we walked down to for the race start and set off on foot as it was too precarious for skis. The narrow trail necessitated single file travel and a number of early falls (including myself) led to some bottlenecks and frustration.
I shared a few moments of humour with Caroline when we recognised the points where we had left and rejoined the trail last year after making an early nav error. None of that nonsense this year.
Upon reaching the first lake crossing it was clear that it was not only free of snow but also had patches of overflow. Overflow happens when the water rises up through cracks in the ice and then sits on the surface. This is bad for a number of reasons, mainly because it wets the ski skins leading to snow sticking to them which constantly needs to be removed.
Thus it was time to remove my skis but as I didn’t have any snow shoes or micro spikes (a decision that I bitterly regretted for the rest of the race) my only option was to gingerly tiptoe across the slippery sheet ice at a frustratingly slow pace.
Upon reaching the other side I stopped for a short break where the safety team also had stopped. Darren informed me and a few others that because of the icy conditions they might not make it up to hut 1 as the snow machines were struggling to gain traction carrying the heavy trailers – they had taken about the same time as me to cross the lake.
I was warm and sweating profusely but otherwise feeling ok.
Refuelled I was now ready for the big climb ahead which I shared with Alex O Shea and Corinne Moss. Alex had a lightweight pulk which didn’t have any runners on the bottom resulting in it skittering all over on anything other than a perfectly flat surface.
As we reached some steeper sections I removed my skis due to the patchy snow cover and ice making it difficult to gain traction even when herring boning (a technique for climbing involving extending your skis at a 45 degree angle and digging in with your edges).
Finding flow
At the top of the climb we were rewarded by a truly stunning mountain panorama framed by a beautiful sunset and I was reminded why I do these things. As my friend Katherine Davis often says I felt like I just wanted to drink it all in. It was perfectly still and calm I could have stayed there forever.
I now found a bit of a rhythm and really enjoyed the next few hours skiing through the fading daylight and into the night. There was a full moon so no need for a headtorch and the mountain landscape revealed it’s spectacular beauty to me.
Just when I thought things couldn’t get any better the Northern Lights made an appearance. I’d never seen them so clearly and they visibly danced around the sky, constantly moving and changing shape. I was truly mesmerized and spent many minutes staring at the sky and surrounding landscape in awe.
People talk about a flow state and for the next few hours I felt like I was in it until in the distance I spotted the light at hut 1. After a very steep icy climb I arrived, about 3 hours earlier than I had last year and in good spirits.
Darren welcomed me inside and I spent about an hour resting eating and drying my feet out. I’d used a vapour barrier (plastic bag) between my liner sock and thick outer sock but because of the warm conditions my feet were macerated so I removed the bag and let my feet air. The same had happened to my hands (I was wearing surgical gloves).
A number of people were sleeping outside in tents but I was still feeling good and decided to push on and I left just as Alex Allen and Rianne arrived. Rianne is a very good skier but was frustrated by the lack of snow which had meant opportunities for good skiing had been limited.
The pass at Tjaktja doom
A short time later I reached the hut at the top of the pass where I’d slept last year, but I calculated that at my current speed I should be able to reach the next hut further down the valley at Saika and still sleep in darkness so again I pushed on.
Pushed on to my nemesis – the descent from Tkaktja pass where last year I had been trapped under my pulk for the best part of an hour. That wasn’t happening again – I carefully removed my skis and twisted my harness so the that pulk was in front of me and gingerly started to walk down, holding the rope to try and steer and control it whilst digging into the snow/ice with my feet to prevent the pulk pulling me over.
This proved to me more difficult than expected, largely because I was going across the hill on a camber not directly down. The snow cover was hard packed and thin so it was pulling quite hard and I had to exert a fair amount of effort to control it. Although the snow was generally hard packed I would regularly break through the crust into the softer snow beneath which was frustrating, especially when the momentum of the pulk then pulled me off my feet face forwards into the snow.
It turned out that I wasn’t the only one to have some “fun” on the pass – Rianne in her own words :
“Going down Tjäktjapass it went wrong. I walked on spikes, but the pulk pushed me over, in a second I was on my stomach, head first, sliding down the pass with high speed. The only thing I could think of was to get rid of my pulk. We got in a spin, which gave me some seconds to unclip my pulk. Luckily I use big climbing carabiners on my pulk; easy to open. I saved myself, but found my pulk with a broken pulling system on both sides. I could fix it with an old trail marker and duck tape”
I eventually got down from the steeper section onto a more gentler gradient so I flipped the pulk round so I was pulling it behind me again and put my ski’s back on to prevent the constant post holing.
This pulk wasn’t made for walking
Unfortunately, I now had a new problem.
Up until now the track had been largely flat or uphill but was now downhill until hut 2 at Singi. This should have been good news especially as the snow was nowhere near as deep as last year and I wasn’t breaking trail.
Because of the icy conditions however the pulk was faster than I was going down. As I went down, the pulk would move forward behind me and the rope would then be dragged underneath it and bring it to an abrupt halt. This prevented it whacking me in the back but then it took some effort to free the rope and was very jarring. It was unnecessary energy expenditure.
The other thing that was regularly happening is that because of the camber the pulk would swing around wildly to the right and then end up in front of me in the opposite direction so I’d need to keep stopping to spin it back around and drag the rope from underneath.
It had been happening up to now and been annoying but not a major issue as I’d largely been going up, but now it was with almost every step. I tried to figure out what I could do to prevent it whilst also berating myself for not bringing the fixed metal trace which I’d left at home. I shortened the length of the trace by tying a knot in it.
This didn’t prevent the rope being dragged underneath the pulk altogether but it did reduce its frequency. The problem now however was that I had less warning of the pulk swings and because the pulk was now closer when it came around in front it went over or just in front of my skis at best stopping me dead , at worst resulting in a fall.
I didn’t know which was the lesser of the 2 evils but I decided to leave the shortened rope as it was for now. Soon I came upon some large blocks of ice blocking the track. I looked up and around and realised that they were the remains of a recent avalanche. There was no way of avoiding the blockage so I had to man haul the pulk over them for around 200 metres which was a pretty good upper body workout.
I needed to decide if I was going to sleep at Saika or continue to push on to Singhi and maybe having a short sleep there before a more substantial one later on as night arrived.
I decided on the latter as I still felt pretty good so I pushed on into the darkness. I can remember this section being a bit of a slog last year as there is a little more climbing, but that as least gave me some respite from the constant pulk wrangling. The section went on for longer than I’d remembered, and I started to tire and regretted my decision not to sleep earlier. As the climb topped out I spotted a wind shelter and decided to have a quick 20 minute power nap inside.
This revitalised me, and I pushed on anticipating easier conditions. Unfortunately this was not the case. Because of the thin snow cover and ice there was no trail on the ground to follow and the crosses were intermittent in this section. The crosses didn’t always denote the best route, they generally stayed on slightly higher ground to avoid the boggy sections around the river (during the summer), which in normal winter conditions would all be frozen and covered in snow.
Now however there was little to no snow cover and the whole area was covered in rocks and unstable ice. I decided to stay left, but this meant hauling the pulk over exposed rocks, ice and thick vegetation. It was hard enough going up the number of small hillocks in this area but then getting down the other side was even more difficult. It was a real challenge trying to lower the pulk in front whilst trying not to slip on the ice and be pulled down over lots of rocks by the pulk.
On a number of occasions I just had to unclip the pulk and set it away in front of me, hoping it wouldn’t either be smashed to pieces on a load of rocks, or canter down some unseen slope or gully.
I eventually got through this section, absolutely shattered and spotted another racer behind me – it was Mathieu. He’d had a good sleep outside hut 1 and was reinvigorated and making good progress. We were now almost at Singhi and briefly chatted and exchanged stories. Mathiau wasn’t stopping at Singhi and pushed on ahead.
I needed to stop however and the hut was a welcome sight. What wasn’t a welcome sight however was that there was no-one there to welcome me.
Maybe they hadn’t seen me.
I entered the hut to find it empty.
Had I got the right hut? There were a few to choose from, but this was definitely the same one as last year and the only one with an antenna on the roof.
I was crushed.
A few message exchanges on the sat tracker informed me that the safety team had been unable to get to the hut the previous night because of the icy conditions but were now on their way. Opening another door there was a small room containing a bed – every cloud!!
Race rules dictate that you aren’t allowed to sleep inside the manned huts, however this one wasn’t manned at present, so I decided to have a freeze dried meal with the water from my flask and catch a few hours sleep. It was daylight now, around 7am so I was conscious of staying too long.
Some time later I was awoken by someone entering the hut – it was Barclay. We briefly chatted – his plan was to have a hot meal here and push on, having slept at hut 1. We said our goodbyes and I tried to get back to sleep, which due to needing to respond to a call to nature which couldn’t be satisfied by a pee bottle was impossible.
More pulk woes
I left the hut still empty down the huge, glaciated valley. A few hours later I spotted a few snow machines approaching me – it was the safety team on their way to the hut.
They stopped and I had a brief chat with Alex before pushing on. After a while I reached the point at which I’d stopped last year (around 53 miles). This should have been a high point – I’d now passed my previous marker and was entering new ground.
It was anything but though – the trail was going downhill again the constant pulk snagging and falling over was really getting me down. Every time I fell down I had to take my skis off to get back up and then reattach them again which took ages. I have a hernia which doesn’t bother me most of the time, but when I do these type of events and am tired the slightest stretch can trigger it which meant straining to try and get up with ski’s still on feet was out of the question, and even reaching down to re-attach them often triggered it. This meant a few minutes of excruciating pain trying to push the hernia back in again before I could move.
This was a real low point of the race for me, I just couldn’t see how I could continue like this for another 8 days. I tried messing around with the trace with different lengths and knots but nothing made a difference. I also tried making an anchor from a piece of paracord but I couldn’t get it to stay directly underneath the pulk.
In the end I just had to push on and put up with it for mile after mile.
Eventually the slope flattened which should have been good news, however I now had some new challenges. Well, they were the same challenges but just more of them. The next section traversed a wide river which again would have normally been frozen and covered in snow, but there was very little snow, lots of sheet ice and stretches of open flowing water.
It was a choice of either following the summer trail over lumpy ground with exposed vegetation, ice and rocks or staying closer to the river and risking dodgy snow bridges, unstable ice and water. In the end it was a combination of them all, and again a real torturous section. On the plus side I was able to gingerly fill my flask from the river which saved time stopping to melt snow.
Eventually through the river section it was time to start climbing again and putting on my headtorch as it was now turning dark. Although going uphill was hard work at least it was straightforward and the pulk was behaving itself. At the top of the hill I received an message on the tracker informing of overflow on the upcoming lakes. Then another set of messages ending with a mandate from the race director that the river section between the 2 lakes must be done in at least a pair and in daylight.
On the descent I caught sight of someone else behind me, it was Ulf. Ulf is highly accomplished having made crossings of both Svalbard and Greenland, We said hi, and then approached possibly the worst section of the route so far, and incredibly steep and twisty descent down through a pine forest. Barclay later commented that for a very competent downhill ski-er it would a very difficult black run. Obviously ski-ing it was out of the question so it was a case of lowering the pulk down ahead whilst trying to steer with the trace and not be pulled down the hill. Even just holding the pulk still was a considerable effort, and regularly the pulk would get stuck against a tree or rock and require significant effort to pull back up and re-adjust.
It was another full body workout and I was sweating profusely by the time we reached the bottom. There was a hut here on the edge of the first lake in which I planned to sleep – Ulf said he wanted to push on further so we said our goodbyes and he departed whilst I settled in. It was around 7pm.
Settled in meaning getting the stove on (the big proper cabin stove), eating a dehydrated meal and drying my sodden clothes. I then climbed into my sleeping bag on the bed and went to sleep.
I was awoken an hour or so later by someone else entering the hut – it was Kiera. We agreed to pair up for the river section, calculating that from the hut it would take us around 2 hours to reach. Alarm set for 4am for 5am start.
Lake Terror
After waking we melted snow for water, had some breakfast and set off into the early morning. As instructed we kept to the left side of the lake whilst keeping a constant look out for overflow. After a while Kiera commented that the ice was good and there was no sign of any overflow so we made our way into the middle of the lake to take a more direct line. I wouldn’t have made this decision if I had been alone, but Kiera has lived in this area all of his life and I trusted him completely.
Normally the lake crossings are marked by a series of branches inserted into the ice indicating the safe route called ruskmarkering. This lake however (and the next) didn’t have any, there was not a single rusk to be seen.
There had been a little overnight snow which the wind was blowing around the ice atmospherically. I was struck by the different types of ice on the lake. When water freezes naturally it is clear and transparent but appears black due to the dark nature of the lake water underneath (hence the term black ice). There was lots of this and some of the deep cracks and layers in the ice were really impressive.
If the lake surface has melted and refrozen then the appearance is more milky and white – it is to do with the amount of oxygen in the water. There were also patches of blue ice around the lake edges which looked like they had been there for a considerable time. Progress was fast, especially for Kiera who had half length skins on his skis as opposed to my full length ones. He would gradually pull away from me and then wait until I caught up.
A steady tailwind helped to push us along, a little too quickly sometimes for my liking and the pulk had a mind of it’s on the smooth surface of the lake.
Hike a pulk time again
As we reached the other side of the lake we spotted 2 people off to the right – it was Jon and Mathieau. We had received a message instructing us to keep to the left of the river. Surveying the land I couldn’t see an obvious way through. We could see some crosses but there was no snow cover, huge patches of sheet ice and an ominous hill.
There was nothing for it other than taking off our ski’s and gingerly picking our way through the terrain. It would have been difficult just on foot with no pulk and wearing spikes. Pulling the pulk over steep rocky terrain trying to avoid the worst of the ice was not just hard physically, but precarious and mentally exhausting. Every footstep had to be measured and tested , going down was just as bad if not worse. Les eloquently described it like “dragging a sea mine through a f**ng hose pipe”
At one point my foot slipped on a piece of ice and I fell hard, twisting my knee awkwardly underneath me as I went down. The pain was excruciating and I lay on the ground gasping for air, convinced I had broken something. Nausea swept over me and I thought I was going to pass out.
After the initial shock had subsided Kiera helped me to my feet and we rested on some rocks for a short while. I could bend my knee just about enough to walk but anything further than that was excruciating. Kneeling was out of the question.
Kiera was also using a rope trace and I noticed that he didn’t have the problem I did of the rope constantly being trapped and then dragging underneath his pulk. He has a single attachment point of the rope to his pulk in its centre, whereas I had 2, one at each side. I used the rest time to make a modification, trying a knot to fasten the 2 cords together close to the pulk to try and simulate this.
We set off again and it didn’t appear I’d broken anything, it was “just” soft tissue damage. The modification appeared to be working too – it didn’t stabilise the pulk which still had a mind of its own, but it did at least stop the rope dragging.
Kiera was also using a lightweight “siglin” type of pulk similar to Alex O Shea but he had manually attached some runners to the bottom which helped stabilise it to a degree.
The route now opened out into a wide estuary so it was back to picking our way trying to stay on the good ice and avoiding open water. We then reached the second lake which was as snow free as the first had been and also as rusk free. As we set off Kiera said that he was going to go on ahead. I had no problem with this, I was slowing him down on the lake sections on which he could move much faster than I could and so I watched as he gradually pulled ahead of me.
Close to the end of the lake I spotted Mathieu behind me, and he had some stories to tell. He had ended up on the wrong side of the river on the previous section (before the climb up big hill) and ended up bivvying out with Jon before retracing their steps the following day. They then had a torturous section trying to navigate the river where we had spotted them and the end of the second lake. They had stayed right close to the river, and Mathieu had fell through some unstable ice into it. Luckily just one foot but it was fully submerged.
He told me that on the last lake he’d adopted and aero position and used the wind to propel him down the lake (I believe he’d taken his skins off completely) but then he built up to a pretty high speed and couldn’t slow down or control himself. He described it as being particularly scary.
He then skied off in front of me, again more efficient with his short skins towards the shoreline which I reached around 30 minutes later. There are some more stories to tell from this section, but we shall come to those later in our story.
Getting onto land proved tricky due to the large swaths of ice barring the way. Sheet ice can be traversed with care if perfectly flat but introduce any type of slope and without any spikes is impossible, especially pulling a pulk. It took a while to find a suitable point, and then it was back to dragging the pulk over snow free open ground.
I decided this was a good point to stop and have a hot meal which I did. As I was packing up Jon appeared behind and we exchanged stories of our adventures so far.
We walked the remaining snow free road section down to CP1 together, trying to find some snow or traversable ice on the side of the road which sometimes proved impossible, and we were dragging our pulks on the exposed road surface. We arrived just as sun was setting to find Joe just setting out. It was great to see him again and I wished him good luck as he set off into the night.
Already inside the checkpoint were Barclay, Kiera and Mathieu.
Barclay told me how, on the preceding river section he had fallen through the ice into open water up to his chest in the dark. Luckily Joe had been with him at the time – he had fallen through too. Joe took charge of the situation, finding a suitable camp spot, putting up their tents, getting stoves on and getting Barclay out of his wet clothes and into his sleeping bag to warm up. It was a terrifying situation but thanks to them both remaining calm and making sensible decisions they escaped and spent the remainder of the night camped out recovering.
I learned later that Alex O’Shea also had a similar experience.
“Towards the end of the lake I could see the trail and made my way then suddenly I had fallen through the lake didn’t touch bottom and had fully submerged. Slight panic as I tried to quickly climb out but this only resulted in me breaking more ice and enlarging the hole. So then I relaxed and placed my poles across to spread my weight, gave one kick to float my legs and slid out. I could at that point have hit the SOS button on the tracker which would have initiated a message I was to cold to reply to thus action would have been taken but my mindset was I was out of the water wet cold starting to shiver it was up to me to try and look after myself.
I needed to get off the ice
Get the tent up
Stove on in the tent
Pull my bag close
And do a full kit change.
I throw up the tent as quickly as possible not to worried about tensioning lines etc.
Stove out I had practiced lighting it but my lighters failed one got wet , one got to cold but I had matches in the bag and as I designed the bag I knew what was in every pocket this certainly helped me deal with the situation.
If there was ever a time I wanted the Stove to light first go this was it and thankfully it did. I could now see steam coming off every part of my body this of course was the wet clothes transmitting my core heat to the outside air. So I quickly ripped the wet clothes off. I grabbed my dry change of clothes and couldn’t tell if they where dry or not I brought them to my face rubbed them on my cheek and couldn’t tell but made the logical decision they must me just cold but dry.”
I’ve reflected on this since the race and I have a few thoughts. The ruskmarkerings would normally indicate the safe passage across a lake, but there were none on either of the lakes in this section. Ice is generally thickest when the water is calm and not disturbed by either wind or flowing water. I think the faster moving water around the river mouth contributed to the weakness of the ice, hence people falling through. I was with Kiera at the time and thanks to him we exited the lake on the left hand side, away from the river and the unstable ice. I didn’t really think about it at the time but I’m thankful for his experience and company during this section.
A never-ending road and the Northern Lights
Apart from a small blister on the back of my left heel my feet were in good condition, and I didn’t have any medical issues. Barclay had an angry looking blister on his foot. John Bamber advised of some incoming “interesting weather” 40+ mph winds and snow for the next day or so.
Barclay announced that he was going to drop down to the challenger and asked what my plan was. There was an upcoming stretch of road for about 7 miles, then a lake crossing and an SFT hut on the far side (Saltolukta). My plan was to reach it and rest there for the night. We all (Barclay, Jon and Mathieu) agreed to set off together with the same aim, although Jon said he might push on through the night. Kiera left not long after we arrived.
Fuelled and faffed out we departed into the night onto another snow free road, awkwardly trying to find patches of snow or ski-able/walkable ice at the side. We were around 23 hours ahead of the race cutoff. The Northern lights made an appearance behind us and I stopped many times to look back, in awe of their splendour.
Although the gradient wasn’t steep the road went up for what seemed like forever before dropping down very slightly to the lake (was the lake on an angle we pondered).
I’d fractured my ribs a few months before the race. Up until now they had been uncomfortable but manageable, but on the climb they had become increasingly painful so I popped some codeine hoping it would help. Just as we arrived at the lake I fell again, and the jolt sent a sharp pang of pain through my already sore ribs. Barclay hadn’t seen and had set off across the lake whilst I struggled to get back to my feet – I couldn’t put any pressure on my right hand side.
I managed it eventually but now the pain had significantly increased – even just breathing was painful, and I was unable to take deep breaths. The lake crossing was another real low point and all sorts of demons whirled around in my head giving me all sorts of reasons why I should quit the race now and head back to CP1.
I resisted their call and upon arriving at the STF hut I was greeted my Barclay who relayed some morale boosting news. He (well Mathieu) had found a hut which not only had proper beds was heated, had electricity and proper bathrooms and showers. It felt like paradise – there were lots of rooms, enough for us to have 1 each with loads to spare. It was around 1am
Barclay announced that he wasn’t going to set and alarm and planned to wake naturally to take advantage of our luxurious accommodation and I decided to do the same. I felt the more rest I could give my ribs the better chance I’d have of continuing but deep down I knew that I couldn’t expect any significant improvement.
A big decision and a beautiful day
I woke naturally at around 7am after probably the best sleep since I’d arrived in Sweden and found Barlcay and Mathieu in the lounge area having risen around 10 minutes before me. Mathieu’s pulk was completely destroyed and unusable, there were gaping hopes in the bottom where there should have been pieces of pulk. He was in the process of contacting the race organisation to see if they could supply a replacement.
The pain in my ribs wasn’t any better and I still couldn’t breathe properly. I had a big decision to make. I just couldn’t see a way of being able to make it another 6+ days to Hemavan, best case I could hope for was that the pain would remain at its current level, but in all likelihood it would get worse especially if I continued to fall which I couldn’t see a way of preventing completely. It was around 50 miles to Kvikkjokk and the challenger finish and we had about 2.5 days to get there. I estimated two 13ish hour days should be enough to get there with plenty time to spare
It would be hard but I reckoned that I could dig in and suffer for 2 days and I mooted the idea to the lads. Barclay said he’d be happy to accompany me, even when I expressed my concerns of how slow I’d be, especially on any steep climbs. What a guy – it would be infinitely more enjoyable to have some company for the next 2 days and I had bonded really well with Barclay, the conversation flowed effortlessly.
And so we set off together leaving Mathieu to hopefully sort out his pulk woes.
We were immediately climbing but there was no sign of the impending storm – it was a bluebird day, wall to wall sunshine and not even the hint of a breeze.
The climb led onto a wide-open valley with far reaching views of the surrounding mountains and apart from a few bare patches was generally good skiing. Barclay described this as the best part of the race so far and I was hard pushed to disagree with him. The open nature of the trail allowed us to traverse side by side and chat along the way.
Before long a figure appeared behind – it was Mathieu. He’d managed to buy a second hand pulk in Saltolukta and was now back in the game – amazing.
On one gentle downhill section Barclay took his skins off to get some more glide. I tried the same, but I found it took painful to push with my poles so just put them back on, it was just wasted time. We ate a late lunch in a lakeside cabin before pushing on over the lake crossing and starting the next big climb as darkness fell.
The temperature also fell bringing with it strong winds which drove the now heavily falling snow horizontally at us relentlessly. Up and up we went into the blizzard until we finally reached the top.
The newly fallen snow helped stabilise the trail and I was actually able to ski down with no pulk anxiety for a short while, but then the gradient increased and because of the whiteout conditions I was unable to see more than a few metres in front of me. I stopped to remove my skis and performed the same technique as Tjaktka – letting the pulk run down in front of me whilst steering from behind and giving it the odd kick when needed. Thankfully there was no camber on the descent and once into the forest below out of the worst of the elements it was quite fun.
Barclay and Mathieu were ahead so I pressed on to the hut at Arktse where I found Mathieu waiting but not Barclay. There was no phone signal – we tried calling out and whistling but to no avail. A series of relayed messaged on the sat tracker and it turned out that he’d missed the turn off to the hut and was bivvying out further down the trail.
It reminded me of the times before mobile phones when you were trying to meet up with your mates. Someone would have to find a payphone, phone the friends mam and relay a message, hoping that they would also phone their mam and receive it. Otherwise, they would end up trawling through all the bars in town trying to find you.
We had a comfortable night in the hut, and the following morning found Alex (Allen) fast asleep in the porch (there were only 2 beds inside).
Final day on the trail
We had a good natter before setting out and meeting Barclay at the other side of the lake.
Apart from the usual falling over and constantly putting ski’s on and off our last day on the trail was pretty uneventful. It was mostly flat through vast forests and lakes, framed by magnificent mountains all around. It was noticeably colder (Alex reckons it was -20), but not a problem.
As we stopped for lunch at another cabin we were greeted by the media team who recorded some soundbites from us all (see vid below)
Mathieu had also decided to stop at Kvikkjokk - I have no doubt he could have made it to the end but he wasn’t keen on taking on the remaining sections of the race by himself, especially given the sketchy lake and river section previous. He preferred to go at his own speed so shot off ahead leaving me and Barclay to complete the final section of the trail together.
Our final lake crossing was framed by a magnificent sunset, another memorable section.
As we stopped to take it all in we could hear loud booming noises followed by cracking. I’d noticed this before on lake crossings but was more pronounced now that we’d stopped. Water freezes as it expands, so as the water beneath the ice was freezing it was pushing up the ice hence the noises. Although potentially disconcerting it was actually a good sign as it meant the ice was getting thicker in the now colder temperatures.
The last descent down to Kvikkjokk was fast and furious – I was managing to control the pulk a bit better (at least on foot). I had become highly attuned to listening to the noises it was making and anticipating from which direction is was going to attack. As the gradient increased I ran down behind it at speed thoroughly enjoying myself.
We arrived in good spirits at Kvikkjokk to be awarded with a completion of the Challenger course, a medal and a hearty meal provided by Darren. We were joined shortly after by Alex who was the last person in the race and the 2nd official finisher of the challenger (because we were on the full course our times were classed as unofficial). Everyone behind him had either been timed out or had retired.
I really felt for the group that had been behind us on the sketchy lake crossing including Les. As they were crossing the lakes the wind picked up and it started raining (I guess it must have been around the same time we were in a blizzard on the hill). This meant people were being blown around uncontrollably, a few people lost skis and ultimately had to make camp to ride out the storm, which unfortunately didn’t abate for some time hence they were timed out.
The rain also led to a large amount of deep overflow which trapped some people between in and the rocky untraversable shoreline, who ultimately had to be exctracted by the Sami snowmobile team. Being told to pair up also led to some people being slower than they would have normally been
If it hadn’t been for this series of events I’m certain they wopuld have all made it to CP1 within the cutoff time.
The journey home
We were dropped off the following day in Jokkmokk where we decamped to a local hotel to discuss our ongoing travel arrangements. Enjoying a coffee who walks in but Les – what are the chances!!
It was great to see him and he informed us that he had a taxi booked to the bus station from where he was travelling to Gallivere and then an overnight train to Stockholm. We agreed to join him apart from Alex who had to get home a bit more urgently so we said our goodbyes.
What turned up was not a taxi, but a dodgy looking guy with slick back hair, porn tash and a tab hanging out of the side of his mouth. He drove a clapped out old van with a cracked windscreen, a load of bit of wood and junk in the back and a plethora of empty beer cans and other rubbish strewn around the passenger seat. In a couple of trips he had transported all of us and all of our gear to the bus station and seemingly wanted no payment. I’ve no idea where Les found him but it was comedy gold.
I spent some time chatting with Mathieu in the airport, he is truly a remarkable individual. He is recently retired at 68, having sold his business last year and has lived life to the fullest, completing races such as the Yukon Arctic Ultra, Lapland Ultra and Iditerod. He’s mushed dog sleighs , rowed solo across the Atlantic and is the only person to row solo through the Northwest passage from Greenland to Alaska. Later this year he is off to the Himilayas to climb an 8000m peak.
It’s truly inspirational to meet someone with such a zest for life.
Strava : https://strava.app.link/RUgzzBtC7Qb
Epilogue
Although I didn’t complete the full race I feel very satisfied having spent 4 and a half days out on the trail and being credited with a Challenger finish. Advertised at 129 miles I ended up doing almost 143. I was still about 14 hours ahead of the cutoff on arrival at Kvikkjokk and I feel that if not for the pain in my ribs I would have had a chance of reaching the end. I’m writing this almost a week after finishing and they are still really sore so it was definitely the right decision to stop.
It was amazing having Barlcay and Mathieu for company for large stretches of the race, and others who I shared some miles with along the way including Kiera and Jon.
This year I felt like my admin was much better, I didn’t make any stupid mistakes (apart from not taking spikes or a fixed trace) and I fueled well. As planned I made full use of the huts en-route and apart from my ribs my body held up pretty well I didn’t have any other physical issues (other than lots of bruises).
My pulk, although not as bad as Mathieu’s was looking very sorry for itself with some nasty gashes and holes, and my ski’s had some nice scratches in them. This year there were 5 finishers in the full race Leif, Joe, Ulf, Jon and Kiera. Hats off to them all, I’m especially happy for Joe who’s race ended in hut 1 last year with frostbite. Bjorn absolutely smashed the Challeger in 60 hours, and Nik wont the new explorer race, which I was also really happy to see Caroline also finish (and win).
There will be some years in the future where (I believe) there will be no finishers, not because of the calibre of the athletes but because of the conditions. I spent (as did many) a significant amount of time on foot. Last year (or in 2021 when I did the training) I don’t think you could walk a single step without deeply post holing and progress was significantly slower.
Although not good for underfoot conditions, the warm temps were a much nicer working temperature and as far as I’m aware there were no cold weather injuries this year.
As for me – will I be back?
Yes I still feel like I have unfinished business in the race but I’d already decided beforehand that whatever happened I wouldn’t be back next year. There are other races and things that I want to do around that time of year – I’d like to improve my skiing, try some other races and also so some independent expeditions such as a crossing of the Hardangervidda plateau in Norway. For now I’m going to rest up and then look forward to some other (warmer) adventures I have planned for later in the year.
10 ways in which a pulk tries to kill you
The nudge
The pulk slides up behind and nudges the back of your skis and/or the back of your legs. With practice these can be anticipated and don’t usually result in a fall unless your skis also hit an obstacle such as a piece of ice or rock/tree root at the same time.
The parallel sweep
The pulk runs alongside you and for a while is controllable until it gently overtakes you and then is pulled across the front of your skis stopping progress. This doesn’t usually result in a fall but does stop progress and requires yanking the pulk back on track.
The full sweep
The pulk overtakes at speed and then sweeps around in front yanking off your feet.
The camber jamber
Whilst descending a on a camber the pulk will take the path of least resistance , which isn’t the path that you want to go and will relentlessly pull in that direction, often to your knees.
The tangle
As the pulk approaches from behind the trace becomes tangled with your ski pole(s) resulting in a stumble and maybe fall.
The short steeps
The ski-ing had been good on nice compact snow. Up ahead a short steep section is sighted. What do I do? I can try and ski down as fast as I can hoping to outpace the pulk. This almost always results in the full sweep and a fall. I can try and edge down the slope sideways on my edges whilst holding the trace to control the pulk. This works sometimes but if the slope is icy my ski’s will slip and the pulk then pulls me over. Or sometimes the pulk ends up on top of my ski’s or tangled with the trace. Othherwise its taking off the ski’s , walking down and reattaching at the bottom.
The long steeps
The only reasonable way to handle these is to swing the harness around so that the pulk is in front of you and follow it down, steering with the trace. For me this is always done on foot. If the track is nicely compacted this can be pleasant but unexpected ice often results in a fall. And if the slope increases then effort needs to be exerted to pull the pulk back.
The parallel pull
Grab the trace and hold it to the side to try and guide the pulk down in parallel whilst also nudging it with your outside foot/ski This often leads to the parallel sweep.
The false sense of security
Life is good – you are on a gentle downhill, the pulk is running beside you and you are able to control it. But what is that up ahead? (pick from corner, root, rock, patch of ice, branch ). I can’t stop and I can’t steer so BANG hello ground.
The slalom
Whilst descending steep ground the weight of the pulk is too much, pulls you over and then continues to head downhill with you in tow
Kit
Pulk
Snowsled pulk and hauling system https://www.aiguillealpine.co.uk/products/snowsled-polar/trail-pulk-system/
This comes with both loose and fixes traces. I choose to use a loose trace predominantly to make access to my pulk easier and as described earlier this was a disaster. I didn’t use the shoulder straps on the harness and never regretted this decision.
Skis
Fischer Transnordic 82 Easy Skin Xtralite Nordic Ski 197cm. NNN-BC bindings
Colltex Mohair Mix Nordic Full length Ski Skins 65mm
Fischer Mohair Easy Skins 50mm
Colltex Natural Skin + Ski Wax for Touring Skis and Skins
Black Diamond Traverse Ski Poles
I was happy with the skis although I believe I could have made quicker progress at times with the shorter skins (I left the full-length skins on throughout)
Feet
Alpina Alaska boots with NNN-BC bindings. These were really comfortable, but they were too big for my feet (I’m normally a 43 and I went up to a 45) which resulted in a little rubbing on my toes and a small blister on my left heel.
Mathieu was using Alpina Pioneer boots which are lighter and more flexible whilst also still very warm. They also have the newer Xplore bindings, which I had considered and then discounted. I’d go with this setup next time.
I started in thin liner socks, VBL (freezer bag) and a knee length ski sock. Because of the warm conditions my feet sweated profusely – I ditched the VBL at hut 1, and ditched the liner sock at CP1 but my feet were still too warm and by the end my boots were soaked in sweat.
In colder temps and if I’d been camping rather than staying in huts I’d still use the VBL.
Montane Phase Waterproof gaiters – taken off after day 1 as my feet were too hot and there was limited snow.
Legs
Dare 2 B Salopettes
Running shorts
I also carried a pair of thermal leggings but didn’t wear then in the race my legs were never cold.
Montane Terra Pants (not worn)
Top
Alpkit Kepler merino wool base layer
OMM Mid Layer
Montane Protium Hoodie
Montane Ajax GORE-TEX Jacket
Alpkit Fantom Down Jacket
Head
North Face beanie hat
Numerous buffs
Cold avenger (not worn)
Balaclava (not worn)
2 pairs of goggles
Sunglasses
Hands
Wrist warmers (not worn)
Thin liner glove
Nitrate gloves (VBL) – ditched these at hut 1
Black Diamond Legend leather gloves
DexShell ThermFit Waterproof Gloves (not worn)
Hestra Heli Ski Mitts (not worn)
Montane Alpine 850 Down Mitts (not worn)
Terratherm hand warmers (little tip – if no longer required these can be sealed in a ziplock bag which cuts out the oxygen supply and deactivates the warming. They can then be taken out at a later point in time and re-activated)
Camp/cook
Hilleberg Soulo BL tent (not used)
This is quite a heavy tent (2.8kg) but its pretty bomb proof. I sometimes questioned whether it was overkill, but after seeing people (such as Olivia) putting up their tents in very strong winds and recounting stories of snapped poles I feel like my decision was vindicated, even though I didn’t end up using it.
North Face Inferno -40 sleeping bag
Alpkit Hunka bivvy bag
Closed cell sleeping mat (not used)
Therm-a-rest Neo-air inflatable mat (not used)
MSR Whisperlite International Stove & maintenance kit
Home made stove board
Fire Maple kettle
Snow Shovel
Leatherman Signal multitool
Electronics
Iphone 14 Pro no signal until CP1, then intermittent to Kvikkjokk
Intu 20,000mAh power bank
Anker 20,000mAh power bank
Peztl Actik Core Head torch *2
Garmin 64s with talky toaster maps installed
Garmin Epix Pro 2 watch
Didn’t need headtorch at all on night 1 as the moon was so bright. Used watch for nav the majority of the time in combination with the map. Never needed to use the 64s
Water and carrying capacity
2l Stanley Flask
500ml Thermos ultimate flask
500ml Nuactiv Stainless Steel flask (in future I’d use 2 of the Thermos ultimate flasks)
500ml Thermos food flask
1l Nalgene bottle with insulated sleeve
I again wore a 25L OMM rucksack at all times with the 2 500ml flasks easily accessible in the side pockets, and snacks in the waist and chest pockets. In the top pocket I had my spork (also helpful for scraping ice/snow off my skis), handwarmers, headtorch , cap and sunglasses. In the main bag was items of clothing I might need to get to quickly such as my goggle, face mask and hard shell when it was too warm to wear it. I did start off with my Nalgene in there too but switched it to the pulk as it was easier to access from there. I was really happy with this setup and would use it again.