Machine-translated from Faroese and not yet reviewed. Read the original.
It is not often that the triathlete Joan Bláfoss takes part in running races. But when she does, it pays to keep your eyes and ears open, because every time she guarantees outstanding results. On Sunday the Danish 10 km Road Championships were on the programme, and our best-ever female distance runner was on the start line.
The big favourite to win that day had withdrawn, so it was somewhat unclear who the biggest favourite might be. According to Joan herself, her race plan was to sit a little behind the leaders and bide her time. But once the race was under way, it was only a very short while before Joan was in front. As Joan says on her website www.joanblafoss.dk, her main aim was to run a good time rather than to think about gold.
And things went well. It was not long before only Elisabeth May, who is also a triathlete, and the legendary 50-year-old Gitte Karlshøj were able to stay with her. After 5–6 kilometres Gitte also dropped off, and now Elisabeth was alone on Joan’s heels, making good use of the strong pace.
With 2–3 kilometres to go, Elisabeth pulled away from Joan, who tried to respond. But a gap of about 5 seconds opened up between them, which Joan never managed to close. When they crossed the finish line, she was 4 seconds short of gold, but Joan should be very pleased with this race. As well as the Danish Championships silver, she also ran a new Faroese record. Joan’s time was 35:32 min!!
With this – yes, I very nearly said victory – Joan has achieved one of the very greatest feats in the young sport of athletics in the Faroe Islands. Indeed, this result can quite rightly be compared with Ása Mikkelsen’s indoor Danish Championships gold in the long jump, Marna Joensen’s Danish Championships silver in the 3000 m steeplechase and Bjørk’s international win over 1500 m at Reykjavík International.
For those of us who look after athletics in the Faroe Islands, it is a pity that we do not have Joan purely as a runner, but on the other hand all Faroese people should simply rejoice at having such a great sporting personality, who is at the absolute top level internationally.
