Elisabeth Edland, a 58-year-old grandmother who’s also a veteran dogsled racer, was first over the finish line in Alta on Tuesday as the annual Finnmarksløpet came to an end. She could hardly believe her victory herself.
“Now I feel confident!,” Edland, from Nannestad just north of Oslo, told reporters after a rough last night outdoors in terrible weather. She had also raced in the wrong direction on Saturday but managed to make up time and win the 500-kilometer race that runs over most of eastern Finnmark in Norway’s northernmost county.
“It’s never over until it’s over,” Edland said. It took her 42 hours and 45 minutes to win the race along with her eight dogs. This year’s race was the 13th for Erland and the fourth that she’s won. Asked whether she may now retire, she said she’d “had a talk with her lead dog Nuna during the race” and decided that “no, we’ve discussed how many puppies she’ll have, so I don’t think we’ll quit just yet.”
newsinenglish.no staff
