ТОКЕ 2015

SNOWKITE ANGELS

Raimo Selen, Christelle Selen (ESPOO, Finland)

The adventure was short this time: the race was buckled in 2 days! So, 260km were sailed in 26h, 12h the first day and14h the second day.

TOKE 2015 was an Express Enduro!

We must say that the conditions of race were at their peak: a very smooth surface, ice over most of the course, light winds and temperatures around zero. Everything to do a race rather quickly, a record of teams that finished the race has been established: 16/28 teams. Last year there were only 5 to finish in time.

But back in more detail on all this ....

We have been welcomed in a 4 star hotel, the Onego Palace of Petrozavodsk, lots of luxury compared to what is waiting for us during the race.... But we spent more time in the basement, to socialize with other competitors : Finns, Russians, Norwegians, Czechs, than being in our luxurious room. The finalization of the material, the latest selection is done among other racers, being all together .... Such as the abandonment of the skates we had planned. Yep there were bright and black ice and skates could have been used. But the bright ice patches didnt extend for kilometers, we chose not to take them, and to limit the weight. In short, the last options, the finishing touches, registration, skippers meeting in Russian .... With our favorite racemaster Dima, a coastguard interferes to change our course, "niet MONAK" he said, there are too many dangers around. It's the only thing I understood from the skippers meeting. We receive our beacons late at night, when the Norwegian team finally arrives (they had lost all their material at the airport). Good atmosphere before the race, each of us is dealing with its business ;-). We are all in the same boat, bound for a great human adventure.

Morning of the race: we have a luxurious breakfast, filling the Thermos, we get prepared and go to the ice. We have an appointment with the sun this morning, a light wind greets us on the Lake Onego. We are prepared for this marathon. The challenge of trans Onego Kite Enduro will be the start, with a surface that stucks to our kites on the ground as a scratch, a shaped ice from the wind ... The fabric of the kite must not break The bridle lines must not be damaged .... We must leave on time ... We succeed to start at 10.08, 8 minutes later than others. But these will save us later, when we catch the head of the fleet. This fleet is found stopped, kites on the floor, no wind, too close to the archipelago ... Raimo has observed it from far away and this allows us to avoid making the same mistake. We go as upwind as possible and widely circumnavigate the checkpoint IVANOVSKI successfully, that is when we take the lead. We are in first place of the race, we enjoy leading for about an hour until one of my ski slips on a patch of ice, I fall, a team passes us (the winners of the race), it takes time to untangle my Kite. I'm using SPEED4 15m2 LOTUS FLYSURFER and Raimo is using 18m2. We arrive at the checkpoint RECHNOI in 3rd position as we try to find a way through these ice blades that lay ahead. There is lots of hammocks around. There is no one to greet us, we reached the checkpoint before the volunteers, which will be fatal for us as we enter a field of ice hammocks, we land the kites as close to the point where the GPS tells us. It took us 2 hours to get out of the hammocks. All other teams coming after us do not come as near the hammocks because in the meantime volunteers arrived by car and has installed their checkpoint outside the hammocks. First mistake. But we start heading toward the checkpoint SUISAR. There is wind, but very few, very very little, we must skate with skis, the sun is shining, it's warm and the ice is hard. Fortunately , the surface makes us move fast: we Kite, we skate, we Kite. The day ends, the sun goes down, we skate with the full moon to reach SUISAR at 20.00, after 10 hours of racing, we are in 12th position, we have a mandatory break of 30 minutes and start again in the dark. The ice is making loud noises under our skis, it cracks like a storm underwater .... This is hardly reassuring, but it is probably due to the temperature change day / night which is doing this. It is 22.00 and we must find a smart place to put the tent. We avoid to stay in a corridor between island and shore, and install our tent on the good black ice. We found our wild hotel with thousands of stars! Kind of different luxury ;-) The routine of the enduro: we let the day hardware and get into the night equipment. Installing the tent, melting the snow (well, it is ice!), preparing meals, drinking, eating, undressing, getting into the sleeping bag ... And the good wool socks on ;-) It's past midnight and closing the eyes after such a day is fully appreciated.

4am, time to go again .... I have slept 3 hours. Fortunately we act such as robots, we know what we need to do, and we do not waste time: to melt the ice, to dress clothes on, pack the staff and the tent away, to eat, close the sleds, and install the kites. All this in the dark. It is 6 am, we leave for a second day of racing toward the next checkpoint, which is KONDOPOGA. Despite the night, the visibility is good, there is no fog as last year. Night kiting is magical, while the day slowly wakes up, with the sunrise. Although we don't pay too much attention to this magical moments, we simply go on, because when there is a little bit of wind, so few of it, we focus and ride. KONDOPOGA is reached very quickly without being tired of few hours of Kite, we keep the mandatory break and we leave for 2km skiing. We find the wind which carry us from KONDOPOGA-SUISAR in no time .... This is amazing .... Last year it took us two days on foot to do what we do this year in 3-4h by Kite?!?!?!?!?!

Once the had the 30min break at SUISAR again, we begin to believe that this race could end more easily than we had imagined ... and faster too. All teams are pretty close in the end, we see kites everywhere, front and back, passing us and we pass some too, all the time. It's a real race. I change my kite to the 10m2 speed4 because it starts to be windy and with this fast ice, it moves rather well .... We're on the way back: we must still reach IVANOVSKI, which is a straight way 20km , it takes time, we have to constantly go upwind, easily doubling the distance. After the turning of IVANOVSKI, we see far away the city of PETROZAVODSK. It is difficult to identify and recognize the hotel building, but after repeated efforts we reach the FINAL checkpoint. Phew, it is about 16h? For the race of TOKE2015 to be validated, it remains to make a loop of 40km (direct km), named the champion loop, which goes to the island of UTOR and back.

Of course, we take the mandatory 30-minute break, and we take the decision to do this last loop in tandem. Raimo is overpowered in 15m2, and we have anymore 10m2 for me as a smaller sail. He will then keep his 15m2 speed4 LOTUS FLYSURFER and will pull me with two sleds, hoping to slow down the speed with all this to pull.... It works without a problem, we move rather well. Until the time we arrive on a minefield .... Extensive 6km of ice hammocks .... Blades that are rights standing in front of us, every single move with skis is dangerous, skis can slip under the hammocks, ice pieces are everywhere, the sled ropes are sticking .... We ABSOLUTELY should not drop the kite, bridle lines would not resist, the tissue would suffer, we are working like crazy to move forward without damage ... We have to master the wind in order not to get hurt in this minefield .... A maximum concentration is required for hours. We meet two teams returning from UTOR: the TEAM JOJO, and RUSSO TURISTO. They are almost done with the race, we still have half of the loop. When we arrived near UTOR, there's a team on the ground, the SHEKSNA team, they seem unmotivated or they do not know what to do next... We greatly circumnavigate the island, so as not to drop the kite down, and we pass them. They observe us with our tandem kiting system and decided to do the same. We have a last-minute duel with them .... The sun is about to set...

We must absolutely get out of this minefield: 6km of ice hammocks before nightfall, if we don't go through it, we don't end the race today. Raimo struggles like a madman to keep the kite in the air, I pull sleds constantly avoiding problems with the ice .... The hard battle lasts few hours ... In the horizon, the Russian team SHEKSNA seem to fight too, but do not move much. We succeed to move more and let a good distance between our teams.

We win a team on the most difficult terrain of the race.

They sail with a CHRONO 18 OZONE, while we have a 15 SPEED4 FLYSURFER.

We leave the minefield with rage taste, fighting.

The darkness comes right after this duel: we just avoided the dangers ... It is 19.00, it is pitch dark, the moon has born on the horizon: it is red, red, red, red as the color of passion, for our struggle to make our last hour of marathon.

We're going straight ahead, back to PETROZAVODSK there remain only 3 hours ahead of us if we want to finish the race today. Fortunately, the wind is still very strong, so flat fast ice for the last 15km: we spin at high speed in the dark night, guided by the lights of the city and guarded by the red moon. She watches us, guides us, protects us?

We arrive at 19:54 in 12th position, winning our last duel on this loop, and very happy to have completed this kite enduro so quickly. We are the last to arrive on the second day, the SHEKSNA team stays sleeping on the ice, they got trapped in the minefield.

We are greeted on arrival by our favorite racemaster Dima, there is so much to tell ..... Joy explodes! And sharing begins ....

We will ride again TOKE2015, while sharing all this with the other teams .... Lets go again ....

After having carried all our gear to the hotel, we meet the other 11 teams who arrived before us, everyone is happy, but so tired .... We all had only a few hours of sleep, each of us has difficulty walking ..., shins are damaged, knees suffer ...., it is better to laugh about it: we're all in the same boat. Sharp ice, and hammocks of ice have not spared us, it was very physical.

We take care of our moral: by sharing all these extraordinary times, sharing our challenges and highlights. TOKE2015 is still going full speed even after the race.

And this is the same even for 48 hours .... The race is sailed and redone .... That is one way to deal with things, to cope, to heal.... Next, we have a 10h long night, three times more than while racing ... Unreal...

And the awards for TOKE2015, the champions are:

1- SEVERYANE Russia

2- UPSETE Norway

3- MOSDESANT Russia

Mixed team: 1- BELLA & STRELKA Russia (2 women)

2- GIGO Russia (H-F)

3- JOJO Tchequie (H-F)

4- SNOWKITE ANGELS (H-F)

There are 16 teams to finish the race, 26 teams started (28 registered).

We do not make a miraculous outcome may be, but the main goal this time was to finish the race, so the goal is achieved and well on time because we still had a racing day ahead of us if needed.

We don't belong to any awards classification, except in the parents ones, we are the only team as parents to participate and to finish the race. I am also the oldest woman on the competition, youngest took it all ;-)

I think we should already be satisfied with that.

The descent on earth began, back to reality .... The road back home, equipment to unpack and store, getting the children back, clothes to wash, readjust to everyday life ...

The competition is also this... It's really an enduro marathon: lots of preparation before, the effort during the time of the race and after the race is also very very long physical and mental recovery ...