Sapporo International Ski Marathon

February 17, 2006

This years race was on February 12. Sapporo had, as usual, a huge amount of snow with 90 cm on the ground. The temperature the night before the race was about -15C. During the race it was sunny,about -8C temperature and windy. The snow was unusually slow. There were about 50 international skiers, a number that should be much higher considering the quality of the race. Several of these skiers are systematically doing one or several new races each year in order to become Global Worldloppet Skiers, if that award becomes available. For many skiers the race turned into a real struggle due to the combination of a challenging course (see Race Course) and slow snow conditions. While the winners time seemed quite normal many citizen skiers needed much longer than normally. There seemed to be an atypical hesitation by many skiers to leave the feed station at the bottom of the hill at the 42km mark.

There were about 800 participants in the 50 km race and 650 in the 25 km race. The winners time in the 50 km race was 2.21.22.

This page was last revised on September 16, 2007