Greetings dear friends and readers! First off, I want to apologize for my silence. I intended to post a few things to my blog this week, but life and graduate school got much busier than I anticipated. I feel like I blinked and now it’s Sunday morning in Helsinki! I’m up early and getting ready to watch Finland play Russia in the men’s hockey gold metal game, so I thought it would be a perfect time to tell you about an experience I had this week that will go down as one of the coolest things I’ve ever done in Finland!
As you know by now, I love sports! One of the things I’m enjoying most about life in Finland is that I have the opportunity to try new adaptive sports and participate in really unique opportunities for people with disabilities! One of these amazing experiences occurred Wednesday evening at Helsinki’s Olympic Stadium! As part of Helsinki’s ski week, I was invited to cross-country ski inside the Olympic Stadium in an event hosted by YhteisetPolut (Common Paths) and the Finnish Paralympic Committee.
YhteisetPolut (Common Paths) is a project started by Miika Honkanen. Suomen Latu and the Finnish Para-olympic Committee are also participants in the project. You can read more about YhteisetPolut, Suomen Latu and their activities here.
Though these pages are in Finnish, English speakers can use Google translate and understand the content quite well. These wonderful groups are working together to create more inclusive sporting opportunities for people with disabilities. I love what they are doing and hope to actively participate in events in the future!
I have gone downhill skiing once in my life on a family vacation to New Mexico. At that time, I used a device that connected the front of my skis to the back of my father’s skis. We had a lot of fun, but of course that experience is a lot different than cross-country skiing independently. I love being in the snow and on ice; so, I jumped at the chance to try cross-country skiing for the first time!
When I first stepped onto the snowy surface at the Olympic Stadium, I was paired up with a visual guide who would instruct me on where to go and how to ski. Petrus is awesome, and if you are by chance reading this, you did a great job! Petrus and I first met at the blind hockey camp I attended in October, so it was great to see him again. I was given a yellow vest to wear for visibility, a headset through which Petrus and I could communicate, ski poles, ski boots and, of course, skis.
Learning to put the skis on was interesting. It took some help from others for me to get my ski boots fully inside the tracks of the skis and locked in. I laughed a lot! I mean, here I was, a 30-year-old American trying this for the first time in the midst of a bunch of Finns who have gone skiing many times. I’m sure I looked funny at first!
As soon as the ski boots and skis went on, it was time to find a ski track and go! Petrus guided me to a track and helped me line my skis up on the track correctly. I quickly learned how to feel for the path, although sometimes the ski track was rough in places, it was generally pretty easy to find and follow.
Once I got comfortable with the rhythm of skiing, pushing with my poles and kicking and gliding with my feet, I realized that cross country skiing felt similar to ice skating! I was so surprised by that! I think learning to ice skate helped me know to bend my knees, balance my center of gravity and shift my weight from leg to leg as I began to stride. I would say that cross-country skiing is actually easier than ice skating honestly! It’s even relaxing, yes I said relaxing.
I loved hearing the sound of my skis sliding on the snow and Petrus and I even kept up a running conversation the entire time. I only fell once or twice, but even then, hockey helped me because I knew how to get up quickly and continue moving. I skied 6 laps!
The experience was over all too soon, I could have skied for many laps more. I hope that someday I can own skis of my own. I want to participate in cross-country skiing much more in the future! I simply cannot describe how much joy I felt on Wednesday! I think the Finnish Paralympic Committee captured my smile perfectly in their Instagram and Twitter posts about the event.
If you are new to Helsinki, or planning to visit sometime, you too can try out cross-country skiing! The city has several ski tracks open during the winter throughout Helsinki. You can find more information about ski track locations here.
If you don’t own skis, that’s not a problem! There are many places where you can rent skis in Helsinki. I’m not very familiar with ski rental so I hesitate to recommend a specific place, but a simple Google search will provide you plenty of choices.
And to read more about my adventures in Finland, click here.