It is billed as the largest ski race in North America. The faithful swear by it, many return to ski it multiple times, and still others have it on their bucket list. In 2024, it celebrated its 50th anniversary, even though unseasonable temperatures left no snow on the ground.
European Inspiration
The Birkebeiner was the brainchild of a local veteran. Tony Wise was born March 15, 1921, in Hayward, Wisconsin. During World War II, he served as a lieutenant colonel with the Army National Guard in Germany, where he found himself quite taken by the natural beauty of Oberammergau in the Bavarian Alps.When he returned to his hometown in 1947, he found a hill 17 miles north, outside the town of Cable, Wisconsin, and purchased it for $750. He created a ski run with rope lifts and called it Mount Telemark after a region and ski style in Norway, a nod to his Norwegian heritage. A chalet soon followed.
Over the years, Wise kept looking for a way to draw more tourists from Chicago and Milwaukee. In 1973, he constructed the 200-room Telemark Resort, with three restaurants and two pools. That same year, 35 skiers gathered there to race through the woods.
It’s called the American Birkebeiner because the original is in Norway. In 1206, after the death of King Haakon Sverresson, a rival faction fought to control the throne. In the wee hours of New Year’s Day in 1206, two skiers carried Prince Haakon Haakonsson, the 18-month-old heir apparent, to safety on an arduous course through the mountains.
Their rivals referred to them as “birkebeiner”—birch legs—an insult in reference to the tree bark leggings they wore. The prince would live to be king and unite the nation, ending a 110-year civil war in 1240. In 1932, in celebration of that midnight rescue flight, 147 skiers did the first Birkebeiner Run.
In fact, one of the American Birkie Week events is the Prince Haakon 15-kilometer race (9.3 miles), for anyone older than 12 and especially for less experienced skiers who might be deterred by the longer races.
But while the race became internationally known, the resort struggled financially, and in 1984, Wise filed for bankruptcy. He contemplated moving the race to Minnesota, but the community couldn’t part with it and set up the nonprofit American Birkebeiner Ski Foundation (ABSF).
The Birkie itself remained stable, but the resort property moved through several buyers and three more bankruptcies. In 2013, members of the Louis family, descendants of S.C. Johnson, bought the property at a sheriff’s auction. The resort never opened again. Throughout all the changes, the Birkie continued, but relied on public land for its trails.
Ben Popp took over as executive director of ABSF in 2013, and the foundation made an effort to acquire the land. In 2021 the ABSF launched a campaign to raise $10.5 million to purchase the property and raze the old lodge. Today, only the two elevator shafts and two front lobby columns remain. Known affectionately as “Telehenge,” the space is being developed as The Lobby Plaza, an outdoor gathering place.
A New Era
The route originally ran from Hayward north to the town of Cable. In 1993, that route reversed, with the race passing over the ice of Lake Hayward before finishing on Main Street in town, where crowds gathered to bang on cowbells and cheer on skiers.But in 2024, they had no snow on the ground, a problem that is becoming more likely each year and that poses a threat to the vital tourism dollars northern Wisconsin depends on in winter. Over the course of a week, snow machines produced 30,000 cubic yards of snow, and organizers used dump trucks and bulldozers to build a looped course of nearly 11 kilometers (6.8 miles), 18 inches thick and 25 feet wide.
“It was a snow miracle in a year no one had snow in North America, the warmest year ever recorded,” Popp said. “It was amazing.” And 2025 is thus far looking to require a repeat effort.
But keeping the Birkie alive takes more than ensuring snow for a single event. Under Popp’s guidance, it has become Birkie Week, with multiple races, including youth competitions, a ParaBirkie, and a Barkie Birkie to ski with your dog. There’s even a Giant Ski challenge, which puts six skiers on one very long pair of skis. “Open” events allow skiers to start whenever they want and compete with themselves to finish.
Popp had a plan. “Rather than doing [Birkie Week] just once, let’s do it all the time,” he said. The Birkie has expanded beyond skiing to year-round mountain biking, paddling, running, and hiking—and all of it for people at all levels of seriousness.
“It’s not just people in spandex, but it’s people in corduroys rolled up, it’s people in knickers, it’s people in baggy pants—you name it,” Popp said.
Birkie Fever
In 1973, Shirley Smith was a junior in high school in Marshall, Wisconsin, when she first heard of cross-country skiing and wanted to try it. “I didn’t know a single person who thought cross-country skiing sounded attractive,” she said. She said she read about the Birkie and “fell hard for what was described as a ‘citizen ski race,' a race for trained athletes but also anyone else who wanted to enter.”Skiing the Birkie became a life goal. But it wasn’t until she was 52 that she finally entered the race with the encouragement of her husband, Terry Shelton. Together they skied the Birkie five times between 2009 and 2014. “I saw that people of all shapes and sizes skied the race,” Smith said. And true to what she first read, trained athletes and “citizens” mixed.
“In marathons and the Birkie you are in competition with the best of the best in the world,” Shelton said. “I think that’s just a cool feeling.”
Jessica Diggins, who has won three Olympic medals, two World Cup titles, and six World Championship medals, skied the Birkie in 2024, as did Olympian Gus Schumacher. Remarkably, Ernie St. Germaine, a member of the Lac Courte Oreilles Band of the Lake Superior Ojibwe, is the only one of the American Birkebeiner’s original 35 participants who is still skiing—and he’s not missed a single one of the 50 Birkies.
Ninety-five-year-old Bob Koebert of Milwaukee keeps a Birkie wall in his apartment, featuring photos, certificates, and the medal from his first race back in 1982. Having completed more than 20 races, Bob Koebert is a “Birchlegger,” while his son Robb Koebert, 70, is an Uberlegger, having surpassed the requisite 30; his most recent race, in 2024, was number 32.
Bob Koebert and his compatriots used to wear matching jackets and hats that read “Fossil Ski Team,” and they held court at a local tavern in Hayward during the Birkie. The Koeberts remember years of subzero temperatures, ice storms and blizzards, and the demands of the hilly terrain. Bob Koebert recalls one long, steep run that ended in a sharp turn. Spectators would gather at the top to watch like judges and hold up numbers to rate the falls.
“Back in the early days, there was no way I thought you could do it without falling,” Bob Koebert said. “After a while, I either got to be a little better skier or they made it safer.” Indeed, under Popp’s direction, part of the ABSF’s mission was to increase safety and provide more support stations. They also eliminated that tricky slope to avoid injuries.
Bob Koebert said he skied his last Korte just weeks before his 82nd birthday in 2011 and came in first in his age group.
“He was the age group!” his son said.
His father laughed. “That’s the only good thing about getting older,” he said.
The Future
More than 13,200 people participated in Birkie Week in 2024, which is quite good for a year that didn’t even have snow on the ground. Popp sees community at the heart of the success—not just the Birkie faithful from the past, but the local partners that have supported the project going forward.The successful purchase of the land has guaranteed their home, and the foundation is nearing its fundraising goal for Mount Telemark Village, which Popp said “would help facilitate families coming together and really be the center point of the community for not only this year’s bikers and runners, but the people that live here.”
“[It’s an] investment that allows us to not only hold Birkie [number] 50 but rather the next 50 years of the Birkebeiner,” he said.
