During the COVID pandemic a new cycling event was started in Imatra, close to the border to Ruzzia. Saimaa is the largest lake in Finland and I suppose since it wasn’t feasible to travel to Sweden for Vättern Rundan the event gained popularity right from the start. Last Christmas I had some recreation money I had to use by the end of the year so I signed up for Saimaa Cycle Tour 2023. It is good to have some kind of a challenge to keep you motivated to train and the event was fun so in hindsight signing up was a good call.
Since the event is in Eastern Finland I packed and drove to Imatra after work on Friday. It is a three hour drive from Helsinki so I had plenty of time before the my designated start time. I picked up my number from the event main square and ran into some acquaintances. I was planning on eating some pasta at one of the restaurants, but ended up just taking a take-away and drove back to the parking lot. I put on my gear at the swimming center and hastily ate my pasta. There was still plenty of time before my start time, but since I really had nothing else to do I just decided to head on to the event area.
I absorbed the atmosphere for a while, but since there was no line to the event office I asked if I could just leave little earlier. There was a slot available in 20 minutes and since I had no real reason to hang around I took a chance. Like you can expect everybody was waiting around nervously and it a relief as we eventually made our way to the starting pit. The groups were sent on their way two minutes apart. I noticed there was a large team in pink in my group and sneakily asked what their plan was. I learned Korpimiehet was aiming for an average speed of 30-32km/h and stopping at each of the stops.
The team’s initiatory fit my original plans quite nicely so I decided to tag along. The announcer yelled 3-2-1 and off we went. The very first part of the route is a sort of a prologue. You just ride over the river and turn back at the round about and then you are back at the start line. It was actually kind of nice as there were lot of people hanging around making a ruckus and you get into the racing mood. The group got out of the city with out incidents and eventually the men in pink went on a single line formation. I managed to grab the best place right after their group and sat there letting them join back in after taking their turn at the front.
The sun was shining and speed of the group was pretty good right from the start so I already thanked myself I had changed to the earlier start time. It turned out I was little early to celebrate as the sunshine turned to dark clouds first and then to a drizzle. To be honest it had been a warm day so I did not really mind the cool water at first. Eventually the rain also stopped, but the roads were still wet and roads almost all the way to Lappeenranta pretty rough. The thing I had not counted on was that now my socks were wet. As it turned out they were going to be moist for the next 12 hours or so.
Another issue with wet roads is that you get sand everywhere. It is on your teeth, on your legs and on unfortunately also on your bidon. Since it was cool I hadn’t really drank that much so I grabbed my bottle and was about to drink when the dirty bidon slipped out of my hand. I managed to yell “bottle” as I ran over my own bottle. Luckily I could hold my line and nobody else fell either. I was embarrassed, but these things happen. Now I just had to manage following 250km with one bottle. The first 10 min stop was at Lappeenranta near the sand castles and I tried to dry my socks with very little success.
From there on the road surfaces were much better for the rest of ride. The group worked well and I was enjoying the free ride at the back. There was some cloud coverage so while it really wasn’t that dark people started turning on their lights. I decided wait out until the next stop until I turned my rear light on. I figured it would make no sense to risk falling trying to turn it on while riding. Pretty soon we were at the next stop and I got a profylactic ibuprofeine tablet I had forgotten to take with me from the medic tent. We weren’t even close to half-way so I decided to hold on to it until 200km point.
Before the event I had a look at the map and elevation contours. I was bit intimated since there was supposed to be almost twice the elevation compared to Vättern Rundan. I had been warned the hills would start in earnest after half-way point in Mikkeli. To be honest it was already pretty undulating. Luckily when you are in a group the hills don’t feel that bad and Korpimiehet was riding them at an easy pace. So I had to pull on my brakes more often going uphill rather than downhill. That style of riding suited me just fine. The only problem was there were some people not really holding their position and wet carbon rims causing some erratic behavior.
It got pretty dark at some point, but there was some light visible in the horizon through the night. I did not really mind the darkness, but it also meant it started to get little bit chilly. I put on my arm warmers, but my teeth were rattling after the food stops until I got warmed up again. Wet socks did not exactly help, but somehow they did not feel all that bad. We joked around that somebody could make a killing selling dry socks. I was close to offering one of the staffers some money for theirs, but figured my wet shoes would just make them moist immediately anyway.
At some point I heard birds start to sing and that was kind of the point when I figured the worst was over. The sun started slowly creeping up and the most beautiful parts of the route were coming up. At Pistohiekka there are some of the pretties views I have enjoyed riding a bike. The lake was perfectly still and I just took in the views. So far I had felt pretty good and while we were already close to the 200km point only the issue was some saddle soreness. I made an effort to stand up every now and do some stretching during the stops. That worked out pretty well and I got some chamois cream from a medic.
At some point the whole ride started to feel like bit of slog. My knees started acting up so I took the ibuprofein I had saved earlier. The stops were frequent which helped, but still I was starting to feel the strain. The group had slowed down and the mileage was adding up slowly. There were couple of times when the group increased its speed and I had to put in some extra effort to catch up. I only had a 46t chainringe so my max speed was somewhat limited and it started to feel little painful to do those sprints. My legs were feeling stiff, but good so I wasn’t too worried. There was a moment when I looked right and the sun was shining through a misty pine tree forest. That is when I finally knew I would be able to finish.
The very last part of the route takes you through some rather boring industrial areas. It is a fitting brutal end to the journey. The pulp mills smell terrible and you are pushing the watts trying to keep up. Eventually you make it to the Vuoksi river and you know the finish can’t be that far anymore. So you just hang on and try to match the accelerations from the round abouts. Eventually we made it to the finish, pumped some fist, got our medals and a hug from the friendly staff. There was some non-alcoholic beer and hot dogs to kick off the morning while sharing best moments of the ride.
Now looking back not sure I want to do Saimaa Cycle Tour again next year, but it was definitely a fun ride. Saimaa is a beautiful lake and really worth seeing at least once. This year’s special thanks goes to team Korpimiehet and it was fun to bump into Jaana, Teemu and Väiski at the event. Next year I might go for the shorter and sweeter Puumala Archipelago Route instead since it includes just the pretty parts of the ride.
Cicli Ukrainello 