[cow bells jangling]
- Announcer: Ten, nine, eight, seven, six,
five, four, three, two, one, go!
- John Kotar: Guns go off.
Off you go.
My name is John Kotar.
I am one of the founders of the American Birkebeiner,
and I welcome you to our race.
Birkie is now a very different thing really
than it was even in the early days.
The growth of this race is almost impossible to comprehend.
The first year there were 35 starters,
and this year we are crossing 8,000.
It's a happening, it's an event,
far bigger than simply a ski event from here to there.
I will tell you,
the electricity, you will feel connectedness with others.
Everybody's coming in with great excitement, anticipation,
optimism, about everything.
And you can't help but be swept into this.
You will see people ahead of you continuously, like a wall.
You look back, and unbelievable--
this mass, this long snake,
is going as far as your eye can see.
And, yeah, I know the clock is running, so I don't loaf.
- Woman: Banana, oranges.
-Man: Oh, thank you.
- Bananas.
- Man: Banana.
- John: So feed stations, of course,
you're always anticipating grabbing a cup,
ski poles still on.
It's very clumsy.
Mostly you'll spill everything.
- Man: Get your hot wax!
It's free!
- Man: You got some 15 there?
- I've got blue and we have white,
but they say the blue's been working best on the track.
- Okay.
- Good luck, guy.
- John: Now you're aiming at those big hills,
and you're working hard.
And I think it's up and down emotionally.
You may have to slow down, you may have to stop.
You are so fried that you can barely move, and yet you can.
You find something else.
Now we're going down,
we're descending on one beautiful hill after another.
[cowbells jangling]
Main Street is pulling you in.
You slug through that sugar.
It's packed with people.
- Announcer: James Daggett of Minneapolis,
John Kotar of Eau Claire.
- Man: Not John Kotar!
Hey, you guys, bib 90004
is wearing one of those magic red bibs.
John is one of only three people
to finish every single Birkebeiner.
- John: There's always something connected to the Birkie.
It is so much a way of life.
Right now it's almost unthinkable.
But if we did lose this in, you know, a couple of decades,
the loss would be horrendous.
Cynical people might say, "Oh, come on, it's just a sport,"
you know, "skiing, you know, big deal, there's something else."
But it isn't just that.
It would affect the region,
the way they see this neck of the woods up here.
So I try not to think about it all that much.
We can have a race with three, four inches
with the right temperature.
But when the two combine,
very little snow and higher temperature,
then you really can't do it.