Vikki Vähä-aho slept in the wild during her trip and spent only a few nights at home all summer.
5 572.3 kilometres in five months. That was the distance covered by the winner of the Tahko Pihkala Walking Challenge, which was held for the fifth time this year.
Background team kept an eye on the winner
Vähä-aho says the longest distance he has walked at one time was 116 kilometres. It took him less than a few minutes to 24 hours.
The victory also included some 80 and 70 km walks. Most of the walks were around 50 kilometres. The average daily distance was around 36 kilometres.
– Recovery days are really important. I’d rather walk a long day’s stage and get flu than walk 36 kilometers every day and not get a proper recovery.
On his travels, Vähä-aho had a change of clothes, rain cover, plasters, creams, electrolyte drink powders and energy drink tablets. Water was obtained from nature, and the competition team took care of food deliveries.
Vähä-aho recorded a total of 152 walking days and just over 1,234 hours of walking. During the whole summer, he only had time to spend a few nights at home.
– A light cover made of nylon awning fabric was included, which keeps the wind out. It is just tuned between tree branches. It’s good to sleep on the ground.
According to Vähä-aho, there were no difficulties on the way.
– Everything went easily. I had a good team behind me, a medical team and a maintenance team who looked and made sure I was fine. I just walked.
You can speed up slowly
The competition’s prizes were awarded on Monday at the Helsinki Olympic Stadium. After Vähä-aho, the runner-up in the race also walked just across the Sahara: 5,224.2 kilometers.
A total of 909 teams and 5,400 walkers participated in the competition.
The race was held in more than 230 municipalities, and the municipal competition was won by the municipality of Hartola, where a total of more than 53,300 kilometers were walked, or an average of about 19.8 kilometers per inhabitant.
– When I was older, I didn’t count kilometers at all. I’m just counting hours and minutes. I go for an hour’s walk every day, and some days I sweat harder than others. One day the content of the walk is a report, another day it’s that \”there is great terrain and nature here today\ says Jantunen.
– In the case of an individual, he interpreted this specifically as running at walking pace. Some walkers walk past me, but that’s okay. Walking is also joint-friendly, and it gives the muscles a jolt that is just right when you walk in this style, Jantunen says.
Vähä-aho has already started thinking about his next challenge and promises that the pace will not slow down.
– There are four of us, and we plan to rent electric bikes, take the train to Rovaniemi and from there to Vesisaari on the Norwegian side of the Arctic Ocean. From there we go down the west coast of Norway, to the Swedish side and from there down to Stockholm, from where we can get back to Turku or Helsinki by ship, he explains.
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