Birkie 2000
New festivities, activities for the 28th Birkebeiner By Ron Bergin Now that the millennium fervor has subsided, it's time to look at the millennium edition of the American Birkebeiner. Fortunately for skiers, there have been no significant efforts to commemorate the coming of the 21st century via the Birkie. Nonetheless, "Birkie 2K" is upon us. It's hard to imagine that after 27 years there could be much of anything new to report, but actually, the 28th American Birkebeiner has a great deal
of newness to it.
B2K opens as it does every year with the Opening Ceremonies – 11 a.m., Salomon Elite Sprints, 11:30 a.m., and the Barnebirkie, 1:30 p.m. – all on Main Street in Hayward on Thursday, February 24. Birkie Friday, February 25, brings us a little bit of the not so old, the even newer, and the totally new.
The Citizen Sprints sponsored by the Hayward Chamber of Commerce and Madshus goes at 1:00 p.m. on
Main Street in Hayward giving citizen skiers a chance to compete on the same course and in the same format as the elites did the day before. The Chequamegon Telephone 10K is back for its second running with some major changes. Last year the race was only 8K and started on a county forest logging road near the north end of the Birkie Trail.
This year the race has been lengthened to 10 kilometers and will start at the Cable Airport at 2 p.m. and use
the same starting venue as the Birkie. The course will follow the Birkie race course up to about one kilometer onto the Powerline and then divert onto the Telemark Birkie 10K trail (the old Birkie incoming race course). The course will follow the Telemark Birkie 10K to the junction with the John Bower Trail, which it will then follow to the Telemark Golf Course and back to a finish at Telemark Resort.
This is a much-improved route that, with the exception of a couple of Powerline hills, is much easier and better suited to the level of the vast majority of skiers who generally participate in this event. It also utilizes parts of two of the nicer Telemark ski trails.
The newest event on the schedule is the Junior Birkie, a 2.5K race at Fish Hatchery Park in Hayward (see sidebar). The event is open to children ages 10 to 15 and starts at 1 p.m. It's still a far cry from the daylong
festival of events of the Birkies of the late 1980s and early 1990s, but at least Birkie Friday is starting to be rebuilt.
Of course, the main events, the Johnson Bank American Birkebeiner and the Kortelopet, take place on Saturday, February 26, with starts at 8:20 a.m. for the elite men, 8:22 a.m. for elite women, and 8:30 a.m. for Wave One. Succeeding waves go at 10-minute intervals.
You may have noticed the words "Telemark Resort" used earlier in this piece. That's right, Telemark is back, and once again involved in the event it spawned in the early 1970s. Slowly and even reluctantly the Birkie Foundation realized and then acknowledged that the current regime at Telemark was for real and wanted to be a major player in the Birkie festivities. While the start area has permanently been moved to the
Cable Union Airport (a far superior start venue than the rolling hills of the Telemark Golf Course), much of what once was at Telemark, is again.
Bib pickup and pre-race registration will again fill the winding halls and function rooms of Telemark's east wing – as will the Ski Fair Expo. And much to the relief of the equipment purveyors and sponsors, the on-snow equipment demos will also take place on the Telemark property utilizing the adjacent trails and ski area.
Perhaps the biggest and boldest move on anybody's part is the return of the awards ceremony to Telemark. Since the demise and razing of the coliseum, the largest and most obvious problem was finding a suitable site for this behemoth event. The LCO Convention Center was the only room in over a 100-mile radius of Hayward that could even approach the holding capacity of the old coliseum, albeit at less than half of what
the coliseum could hold. Here's where original thinking and faith in the new Telemark management came into play.
As Telemark began to dig out from years of indifference and neglect under its previous management, a novel proposal was developed and presented to the Birkie Foundation to return the awards ceremony to Telemark. Here's how it will work:
Every major meeting and function room will be pressed into service for the B2K Awards Ceremony. The
Namakagon Room(s) will serve as the main, live-action presentation site for the awards. At the same time, the Laukka Theater, Red Arrow Room, and other function rooms will be set up with closed-circuit television over which the awards ceremony will be broadcast. Each of these rooms has a capacity of 300-400 people, which when combined at least equals what the convention center could hold.
In addition, The Outpost restaurant, Baby King Haakon Bar, and the Telemark lobby will be similarly set up for awards viewing. For those staying at Telemark Lodge, or in the nearby townhouses and condos, the awards ceremony will be piped directly to their rooms over the closed-circuit system. For what it might lack in first-person presence, it more than makes up for in originality and resourcefulness. It will undoubtedly be
a logistical and technical challenge, but if it works, it could be the solution to the perennial dilemma of what to do about the awards. Hats off to Telemark for having the guts to undertake such a venture – let's hope it works.
A couple of additional notes on Telemark: This fall we reported on the rebirth of Telemark Resort in as much as the resort had been purchased by a coalition of interval owners from Christiana Villas, Telemark
Lodge interval units, and Telemark Point known as Telemark Interval Owners Association (TIOA). The latest report is that thanks to a yeoman effort by TIOA and Six Hats Hospitality, the management company hired by the association, much of the infrastructure requiring immediate attention has been addressed, including the kitchen plumbing, a new boiler, a new roof on the core section of the building, and numerous
other repairs that the average visitor would not even notice. The Telemark bar, renamed the Baby King Haakon Bar, has been open for some time now and in mid-December the Telemark restaurant, renamed The Outpost, reopened with a modest menu, but dedicated to serving quality food and adding upper-end offerings as time progresses.
All major staffing positions have been filled both inside the lodge and on the grounds. A small amount of
snowmaking has been done to prep the JB ski hill for snowboarding and tubing. Numerous cross country ski trails have been mowed and/or reclaimed after logging operations on or adjacent to the property. New grooming equipment is being purchased and old equipment repaired. Somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 kilometers of cross country ski trails will be available this winter. Plans for next year still include significant
renovations to a major portion of the lodge rooms and new snowmaking equipment and downhill grooming equipment.
At the time of this writing in late December, registration for race day had reached over 4,300 skiers, with about 80 percent of those registered for the Birkie and 20 percent in the Kortelopet. This level of registration puts the event on pace for a total of about 7,000 racers. The "percent-back" qualifying system is
working well and has helped achieve the goal of maintaining balanced wave sizes. It is felt that this is a far more equitable basis to place skiers in the wave for which they are most appropriately qualified. To review: An ideal wave size of 650 racers was determined. Using that target wave size and the averaged percent back, a cutoff is determined for each wave. Each successive year's race will be factored into the four-year
average. Cutoffs may change by a percent or two, but it is expected they will remain fairly constant. In B2K the elite men's wave will include only the top 200 men and elite women's wave the top 50 women.
One new factor which may have an impact on registration, not so much on quantity but perhaps on the quality of competition, is the inclusion of the Birkie as a part of the new FIS Marathon Cup. The cup was
created by the Worldloppet League and the Cross Country Committee of the International Ski Federation (FIS) to encourage a higher level of competition, similar to that found in World Cup events. The American Birkebeiner is one of eight races in the series, the others include Worldloppet marathon events in Austria, Italy, Germany, Estonia, France, Sweden and Switzerland.
Past Birkie champions Johann Muehlegg (1999), then skiing for Germany and now skiing for Spain, and
Mikhail Botwinov (1997), then skiing for Russia and now skiing for Austria, are examples of the World Cup level of competition that might be expected as a result of the implementation of the Marathon Cup and are potential competitors in this year's Birkie. A total of $23,000 in prize money will be divided among the top six men and women finishers.
Whether or not the FIS Marathon Cup will make a difference in the competition remains to be seen. It was
thought that the institution of the Worldloppet Cup points series would do the same and no doubt did encourage the likes of Botwimov and Muehlegg to ski the Birkie. However, both were in transition from their home country to their adopted country in the year they skied the Birkie and were ineligible to compete on the World Cup circuit, which made the Worldloppet a more viable option for them at that time.
The FIS Marathon Cup will undoubtedly bring some new faces to the Cable-Hayward area the last week in February. Who knows? We might even see a dead-heat sprint between Muehlegg and Botwimov. Factor in Carl Swenson and his patented sprint to the finish, which earned him second place in last year's Birkie, and we could be in for a wild finish.
It is always difficult, if not impossible, to predict who among the elite and other significant skiers will be on
hand for the Birkie. Certainly the FIS World Cup will have an impact, and we can always count on the Factory Team and other former Olympians and top U.S. elites. Though she may not be an elite, Jacque Lindskoog has been a fixture at the Birkie for the past 27 years. This year will be different for founder Lindskoog, as she will not be at the starting line on February 26. Instead, Lindskoog will be participating in the yearlong Odyssey 2000 Bicycle Tour (see side bar).
As we have mentioned, the start for this year's Birkie and Kortelopet will return to the Cable Union Airport. The start area has been graded and seeded to provide a smoother, more level starting surface. Otherwise, with one notable exception, there will be no major changes to the course.
This past fall the entire Birkie Trail was remeasured to determine the actual distance from the new start area
and to reposition all of the K markers. Several teams of volunteers moved the K markers and posts to their new locations in mid October. The difference between the old start area and the Airport start is approximately 1.5 Km, so every K marker is now that much further down the trail. A couple of prominent landmarks and their "new location" include the Powerline Food Station (#1) – 4.5K; the first really steep
climb on the trail itself – 7K; Timber Trail Food Station (#2) – 9K; Bayfield/Sawyer county line – 10K; Firetower Hill (aka the Highpoint) – 12.5K; Cty Hwy OO – 22.8 K, etc. The actual and official distance for the Kortelopet will be 23K. The official distance of the Birkie will be 51K, although it actually measured out closer to 50.5K.
Possible alternative finish venues and courses for the Kortelopet as reported in Silent Sports (April 1999)
have thus far amounted to much ado about nothing. This past spring the American Birkebeiner Board of Directors voted to institute a Seeley Start/Hayward Finish scenario and began pursuing this option. The concept ran into difficulties, however, as the Sawyer County forester was unwilling to allow the clearing of an area sufficiently large enough to provide for a good start area for the Kortelopet in the Seeley Hills area near the Birkie Trail.
Another possible option of using a farmer's field some distance away was also investigated, but dismissed.
It was also felt that the spectacle of the huge combined start, as at present was an important visual element to the race that should not be diluted, and with implementation of the 10-minute start interval, congestion in the early part of the race has indeed diminished. In the end, the subcommittee charged with studying the
Seeley start agreed that the existing alternate options were unworkable and for the time being abandoned any plans to change the start of the Kortelopet. Perhaps deferring to the logic of "if it ain't broke, don't fix it," the Kortelopet will continue to start and finish as it has in the past, or at least until another viable alternative is presented.
On the trail this season, and for the race itself, the American Birkebeiner Ski Foundation has acquired a new
Piston Bully 100 groomer. It is a smaller, lighter machine with smaller, three-inch cleats that will provide the ability to till and groom as little as three to five inches of snow. This groomer will complement the larger LMC which will be used to groom larger amounts of snow. In the very early season, snowmobiles will still be used for initial grooming. Given the volatility of snow conditions the past several years, it is good that
there is now this amount of flexibility in the grooming arsenal.
Speaking of snow conditions, one of the important things learned from the difficult conditions of 1997 and 1998 is that there are ways to still make the Big Event happen regardless of what Mother Nature has to say about it. These lessons and contingency plans will all be drawn upon should history continue to repeat itself.
There are few other logistical concerns to report on this year, as many of the problem areas of years past, such as busing and parking, have been fine tuned and will continue as they have.
There are a couple of new faces in the form of major sponsors of the Birkebeiner and related events. Johnson Bank (formerly Heritage Bank of Hayward) has stepped up from its sponsorship of the Kortelopet
to take the title sponsorship of the Birkie. Johnson Bank is among the many holdings of Sam (S.C.) Johnson of Johnson Wax. The Johnson family has long been a supporter of the Birkebeiner via one of its business entities or another. The Johnsons own property on Lake Owen and throughout the Cable area where they spend summers and visit frequently. Johnson Bank president Walt Jaeger also sits on the board of the American Birkebeiner Ski Foundation.
You can't open a ski magazine or outdoor publication of practically any kind these days without seeing a major print ad campaign and sponsorships by Subaru of numerous cross country ski events; you can add the American Birkebeiner to that list of events. Subaru is the official automobile sponsor of the American Birkebeiner and will have several of their all-wheel-drive vehicles on hand during this year's Birkie.
Subaru is offering some attractive incentives via their Birkie sponsorship as well. If you purchase a new Subaru during the year 2000, you will get five years of free Birkie entries, a Birkie warmup jacket and a Birkie poster. Given the price of a Birkie entry these days, that's not a bad deal.
In addition, the Up North Newspaper Network also joins the list of Birkie sponsors. Up North owns
several newspapers throughout northern Wisconsin and Minnesota, including the Sawyer County Record (Hayward), Spooner Advocate, and the Daily Press in Ashland. Nordic Equipment is also rejoining the ranks of Birkie sponsors and SGS Vacations will be offering a round-trip travel package to New Zealand and Australia.
The new millennium has come (or at least the year 2000) and the 28th American Birkebeiner will soon be
run. The Birkie continues to evolve as an event and organization and as Nordic events in this country, is one of the oldest. But every year there is indeed something new about the event – and this year is no exception.
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