The Viking Tour of Norway - Summary

Date: 19 July to 25 July 2014

Distance: 760km

Vertical climbing: 13,000m

Seven days of cycling through a part of Norway that we would not have got to otherwise was all that was needed to convince Leah that we should go to Norway and do the Viking Tour of Norway.

What is the Viking Tour of Norway? It is a 7 day road cycling stage race that takes you into some of the most beautiful parts of Norway, and is promoted as the most scenic race in the world. Having done it I would have to agree. What they forgot to say is that it goes from sea level to mountain top to sea level most days, and the roads seemed to climb at a steady 10% when they went up.

We flew up to Oslo on Friday afternoon and caught the rider bus from Oslo airport to Vagamo where the start was on Saturday. Once there we put our bikes together and did the first stage, a short 5.7km climb that climbed 690m on rough gravel. The bus took 6 hours, and went a very route scenic, when it was only meant to take 4,, but not what we wanted before the grovel up the gravel road for the first stage.

I came in 2nd in my age group and Leah also had a good ride. The ride up was hard, but the ride back down was really hard on the loose gravel road that was over 10% for most of it. Eventually we made it back to the hotel just before 9pm. Lucky it is light until 11pm.

For the next 6 days we raced every day moving 3 times over the next fews before looping back to finish 880km later in Vagamo. Each day we climbed from sea level to above the treeline, through mountain villages, over rocky granite mountains and between glaciers. It was everything I would have imagined and more. It was also faster and harder than I planned. The stages typically started with a nasty climb, then there was a flatter section before a final climb. Each stage was between 60km and 160km, and had about 2000m climbing. My goal was to stay with the leaders over the first climb, which meant been in the top 10-15 riders out of 200. For the first three days it went to plan, then I started to fade.

Two of the days started with a free ride to the start, as we needed to catch ferries before the start line. These were enjoyable times as we were able to stop and take photos and enjoy the spectacular scenery. Over the Eagle Panoramic road, and down into Geiranger was a highlight. After catching a ferry we climbed up through a big valley to pop out beside a lake in a glacial formed valley. From there we enjoyed mountains and distant glaciers as we climbed slowly to the head of the valley, and eventually the overlook to Geiranger. 500m straight below us, is Geiranger floyd surrounded by high mountains. The most spectacular view of the trip.

What awaited us after enjoying a strong coffee in Geiranger was a 1500m climb up ….. over 16km. Up again and this one really hurt and had a kicker at the end with the last 4km been at over 10%... Enough on that.

At the end of the week I managed to keep my 2nd place for my age group out of 35. Leah enjoyed her first stage race, and after she broke her chain on day 3 loosing 40 mins she enjoyed the race a lot more and treated it as a training race.

A typical day:

Walk and breakfast and get to the start by 9am
Bags downstairs, as these are moved to the next hotel
Free ride to the start and then after a short neutral section through the start town, racing is on
Finish racing 4-5 hours later and make your way to the hotel
Recovery shake, quick shower and find food
Rest and do any maintenance or laundry that is needed
Eat at the buffet provided by the official hotel. Eat some more.
8pm prize giving for the day and briefing for the next day
Rest and sleep

Repeat the next day. In stage racing, life becomes pretty simple.

Some stats

760 Km
13,000 Vertical climbing
Total time
30km in tunnels
7 ferries
A lot of smiles