Ridderrennet (Page 1)

By a tall START sign in a sunlit ski arena, an older man in a white and navy jacket goes through papers with a soldier in camouflage uniform. Freshly groomed ski tracks and red course markers

Ridderspranget

Breaking trail

Five essays on artificial intelligence are all very well, but sooner or later someone asks what we actually do about it. Here is the report from our own workshop, wrong turns included.

Three happy children in winter clothes hugging each other during a ski race in snowy weather. Two of the children are wearing blue race bibs that read 'Barnas Ridderrenn'.

Ridderspranget

The warm bridge

Our series lands where it hurts, with loneliness. Artificial intelligence can ease it, and artificial intelligence can preserve it. The distance between the two is uncomfortably short.

An Underwood typewriter illustrating the technological evolution of mechanical writing, as Pellegrino Turri's original 1808 prototype has been lost.

Ridderspranget

The super-resource codes the future

Society tends to enter disabled people on the cost side of the ledger. The history of technology enters them somewhere else entirely, in the development department.

Historic black-and-white photograph of a tandem bicycle in a rugged mountain landscape, with the rear cyclist appearing as a transparent glass-like figure.

Ridderspranget

The invisible guide

Ridderrennet has been refining the art of guiding since 1964. Now a new volunteer has turned up. One who never sleeps, never freezes, and never asks whether you really need help with this as well.

Two cyclists, one on a standard mountain bike and one on a red recumbent trike, on a gravel road in an open mountain landscape with a lake in the background.

Ridderspranget

Adapt the tool, not the person

One sentence from Beitostølen turned the whole idea of mastery on its head. Fifty years on, it turns out to be the best user manual we have for artificial intelligence.

Illustration of a figure half human, half robot, working at a computer

Ridderspranget

Stordahl's next question

More than sixty years ago a blind man refused to accept that something was impossible. The question he asked still carries Ridderrennet today. Now it has a new mountain to test itself against.

Crown Prince Haakon, in a blue "Ledsager" guide vest and red beanie, stands speaking with a blind elite skier in a red-and-white Swix racing suit. Snowy forest behind them.

Norway's most underrated leadership role

It is about replacing control with relationships and collaboration. A clear setting of expectations works as a contract, and creates the psychological safety to perform.

King Olav V on skis at the first Ridderrennet, April 1964, flanked by two young children holding small Norwegian flags. A larger Norwegian flag and crowd stand behind him.

Ridderspranget

We who ride in the dark

The story of a small organisation with big visions, and a plan to save the world. Or at the very least, to make it a touch less lonely.

A tweed flat cap rests on a desk in the foreground. Behind it, in soft focus, a gaming PC screen and a couple of fantasy knight figurines on a shelf.

Ridderspranget

When the body fails, the soul needs a passport

A debate is raging about screen time. It is missing some crucial nuance. And Beitostølen, of all places, already holds the key to the future.

Queen Sonja, in a white wool hat, laughs heartily with Erling Stordahl, founder of Ridderrennet, in a red knit cap. King Harald stands behind in red. Snow falls around them.

Ridderspranget

The Queen was told in no uncertain terms: "blow your nose on your mitten!"

In an age when diversity and inclusion are meeting resistance around the world, and are reduced at best to polished after-dinner speeches, the story of Ridderrennet and the Norwegian royal family tells a rather different tale.

A lone runner on an empty, curving athletics track, seen from above in black and white. The runner casts a long shadow across otherwise deserted lanes.

Diversity

Are you ready for the Paralympics of loneliness?

They look perfectly healthy. They sprint for the bus, they scroll the feed, they perch on expensive ergonomic chairs in their home offices. And yet they are quietly qualifying for a sport those of us with disabilities have dominated for rather too long.

An elderly Japanese barista pours coffee behind the counter of a traditional kissaten, surrounded by vintage cups, glassware and well-worn café equipment.

Ridderspranget

Are you afraid of growing old?

I will admit it. I am afraid. Not of growing old, exactly, but of becoming dependent on help and not receiving it. Still, I have quiet hope of rescue from an unexpected direction.