The Day Before The First Big Race!

It’s here at last and I’m not nervous at all! If you believe that you believe in Leprechauns! Anxious, nervous, jumpy and really excited all at the same time-that’s me!

We’ve spent the last two days preparing, being tourists and skiing the track. We went to the factory to where they make the genuine Dala horse. These decorated toy horses were being sold from some of the villages around Mora as early as the first half of the 19th century by the Olsson family.

We ate a variety of new foods like Spanish waffles (in Sweden) and moose schnitzel along with a Lindenberry and chanterelles appetizer-delish!

This morning we dropped our skis off to get to get waxed by the Swix professionals then headed to Oxberg Kontroll/checkpoint station to ski on the race course. It was surprisingly hilly and quite fast. However, this might change tonight as there is 5 to 10 cm of snow in the forecast. Hence, we’ve decided to go with wax skis as opposed to skin skis.

After our ski we picked up our freshly waxed skis and Ross says that they are a work of art! We have packed all of our bags, laid out all of our clothes, had a great dinner, made our breakfast wraps and have set our alarm for 2 am to drive to Mora. We have to be there to catch the bus to the start in Salen where we line up in our pens at 5:30am for the 8 am start. We are ready- we hope! We can not imagine lining up at the start with 16,798 other participants! ( let alone skiing with them!) Good night!

p.s. you can watch us on Vasaloppet T.V.