Memories from Lillehammer

My only live Olympic Experience is the 1994 Olympic Games in Lillehammer. I stayed in Lillehammer/Hamar/Oslo for 4 days and had a great time.

I arrived in Oslo, by the night train from Stavanger, early morning Friday, February 18th, and took the morning train to Lillehammer. Coming to Lillehammer was a dream come true - 18 years after I watched my first Olympic Games on TV. And the atmosphere in Lillehammer was remarkable. From this Friday I remember hearing on the radio that Dan Jansen finally won the Olympic gold he deserved. And I remember being at the Olympic Stamps Fair when I watched the Norwegian favorite, Fred Børre Lundberg, win the ski jumping part of the Nordic Combined, getting himself an excellent position for the cross-country skiing the following day. (Yes, this was back in the days when the athletes needed a days rest between the two events ..) In the evening we went to a blues concert with my local hero - Reidar Larsen.

Olympic tickets were hard to get in Lillehammer. I think the whole of Norway wanted to go there, and there just wasn't tickets for everybody. I had applied for tickets for several speed skating events, and I ended up with four tickets for the womens 1500 m, scheduled for Monday, February 21st.

I still had a weekend to spend at Lillehammer, and Saturday it was possible to watch the nordic combined and the mens 15 km cross country skiing events without having a ticket. It was free to stand along the course, outside of the stadium, IF you could find a place to stay :-) I was too late for the nordic combined. I arrived just in time to hear the roar from the stadium when Fred Børre Lundberg crossed the finishing line to win the gold. One hour later we were ready for the 15 km pursuit event. Bjørn Dæhlie was in the lead, but russian Vladimir Smirnov seemed strong. Could Dæhlie make it, and win his 5th Olympic gold? Most of you probably know that Dæhlie did in fact win. He continued to win 3 more Olympic gold medals in Nagano four years laters, and he retired as the most successful winter Olympian ever!

At the time we didn't know that of course, but in the evening we could all celebrate two Norwegian gold medallists at the medal ceremony in Lillehammer. It had been a very long and exciting day.

I will continue my Olympic memories tomorrow. The picture shows (from left to right) my aunt, my brother and my mother (who all got Olympic tickets for Christmas two months earlier) on their way from Vikingskipet after the womens 1500 m.