By Fredrik Sträng
Sixty-eight days, 125,000 vertical metres and a daily grind of 12–20 hours — that’s the arithmetic of an expedition that was part endurance test, part experiment in what the human body and will can endure. I burned 8–10,000 kcal a day, watched ten kilos fall from my frame, and crossed knife-edged ridges, blistering snowstorms and endless seas of loose rock. Peak after peak blurred into one relentless odyssey: a speed record on paper, but a deeper transformation in practice. This is the story of how geography, grit and companionship conspired to remap my limits.
On July 1 I stepped onto a trail with a plan so simple it felt reckless: climb every one of Norway’s mainland 2000-metre peaks within a year. What started as a quiet answer to the mountains’ call became the loudest, most unexpected chapter of my life — and, somehow, a new speed record: 68 days, 21 hours and 59 minutes to complete all 377 summits and becoming the first Swede to summit them all.
If you picture a record attempt as one long straight line of triumphs, let me add some colour: twelve days and 100 summits in, my knees declared war. Osteoarthritis—sharp, humiliating, utterly convincing—turned every step into an argument. Standing on one foot felt like balance practice for survival. Walking down a wooden staircase felt like a minor Himalayan expedition. Quitting looked, for a minute, like the most honest option.
One year earlier, my doctor had declared open war on my knees: “You can never run again.” The words hit me like a punch to the face. Running, climbing, moving fluidly through wild landscapes had been my lifeline — my oxygen. Without the mountains, who was I? The verdict was more than a medical statement; it was a life crisis that spiralled into depression. Was I doomed to trade ridgelines for a lifetime of cycling on flat asphalt? I refused to surrender. The dream of high places still burned too fiercely. Desperately, I began scouring the internet for answers — searching for any method, any glimpse of hope that could keep the dream alive until my knees were strong enough, or ready, for surgery.
I didn’t quit.
Why? Because adventure is rarely about the clean, logical reasons. It’s about the ridiculous ones, too: the stubborn pride that says, “Not this time.” The debt I felt to the partners who’d rearranged their lives, to the sponsors who trusted me, to a mountain that had watched me fall apart and somehow kept inviting me back. Most of all, it was for the love of the mountains themselves — the particular, stubborn beauty of Norwegian rock and ice that has a way of making the rest of life feel both small and sharper.
Speed in the mountains is a strange thing. Move slowly and you see every lichen; move fast and everything becomes distilled into pure sensation. I believe both matters. This project wasn’t about sprinting past beauty — it was about honouring it by showing up, again and again, in whatever state I had. It turned out that going fast could be a way to pay attention just as much as going slow.
I never set out to chase Norwegian Sindre Kolbjørnsgard’s record of 73 days. Sindre, in fact, is part of the reason I began — his humility and the purity of his approach gave me courage. But records are contagious. After three explosive days in Hurrungane with Mats Sagbakken, when we knocked that whole massif off the list like a string of beads, the possibility of beating Sindre’s time stopped being a math problem and started being a dare.
There were unforgettable people who carried me. Sebastian, Ivar, Petter, Øyvind, Mats, Erik, George — you lifted me when my legs wanted to stop lifting. Sindre shared knowledge with open hands. My family — mother, father, sister — believed in me when I could hardly believe in myself. Sponsors and hundreds of followers sent encouragements that felt like fuel. To every one of you: thank you. From the bottom of a very tired heart, thank you.
There were comic moments, too. Midway through the run, I realised I’d lost ten kilos — not the kind of side effect you plan for but one that made all my clothes flap like flags. I learned how quickly a body can change. I also relearned the absurdity of human logistics: the things you actually pack versus the things you wish you had, the freeze-dried meals that kept you going, the GPS signals that teased you like a shy reindeer.
And there was fear. My mountaineering career nearly ended on K2 in 2019 — a disastrous expedition that remodelled my relationship with risk and left me with years of pain and the belief I might never run again. On K2 I was infected by an amoeba. I pissed blood, puked and shitted my pants in the same go. Some years later, I was given bad news by doctors, had stern conversations with reality, and learned to live with a smaller set of certainties. Osteoarthritis in my knees. My cartilage was practically gone, which explains the striking pain. Bone against bone. Yet the longing to climb Norway’s 2000s never left. The books by Julia and Morten Helgesen, «Norway’s mountain peak over 2000 meters,» fed that spark into flame. I promised myself a year to see them all. I didn’t quite keep the calendar — apparently, I prefer fast promises — but I kept the purpose.
This journey also taught me something blunt and crucial: mountains are not immune to time. Glacial shoulders recede, ridgelines quiet under different weather patterns. To climb is to witness, to mark what is still there and what is already changing. That’s an educational angle I think about a lot now — the awe of nature tied to the responsibility of protecting it. If you love a landscape, you must be willing to be its advocate.
There’s a technical point for the curious: Norway’s 2000-metre list spans wildly different terrain — from knife-edged ridges in Hurrungane (a Jotunheimen massif known for its combative, dramatic peaks) to long, wind-scoured approaches and glaciated traverses. Each summit is its own small expedition: route-finding, weather reading, the tiny human rituals that keep you sane and moving. If you’re a climber, you learn to read maps and rock in a new alphabet. If you’re not, I hope this gives you an idea of the many landscapes that stitched this record together.
Records are meant to be provoked and improved. I hope someone breaks this one. Records make us get out of bed, they make us train, and they spark conversations about limits. But the truth is, this is less about time on a stopwatch and more about a life reclaimed. I rebuilt, step by stubborn step, some belief that I am still capable of unexpected things. I lost weight, gained stories, and found a new project: rebuilding strength “like Hercules” (my physiotherapist laughs at the exact measurement of that goal), while making a documentary that will be a homage to these peaks — a visual love letter to Norway’s high places.
If you want proof, the climbs are verified by fjelldatabasen.no, and you can follow the lines on my Strava and inReach pages: https://live.garmin.com/fredrik_strang. Numbers are tidy; experiences are messy. Both matter.
Norway: I’ve been to over ninety countries and every continent, but your landscapes still made me gasp. Be proud of this land. Protect it fiercely.
From the Trail: The Diary (June 30 — September 17)
Below, I continue, drawing directly from my diary. These are the lived pages: strategy, blowups, laughter, white-outs, and the tiny human things that made the project possible. Each block below is drawn from the diary I kept during the run.
June 4 — “Adventurers wanted.”
A month before the start, I wrote what essentially was a modern-day Shackleton ad: “Do you have the courage — or the madness — to take on the challenge? No pay. Icy winds. Long days of sweat, chafing, and self-examination. Possible doubt and existential crises. The reward? Doubtful. Honor? Maybe.” It was half-joke, half-serious. I knew the type of people needed for this—those who crave the hard stuff, who prefer Type-3 Fun. The ad pulled in a few of the right kinds for which I am forever grateful.
DAY 1–13 — The explosion: 108 peaks in 13 days
We opened furious. Ten peaks the first day in Gjendesalperne; by day three, we’d bagged 35. The plan—basecamps, daily loops, weather windows—was surgical: camp, loop, return, rest, repeat. But the mountains laughed at our neatness. Plans were nothing; planning was everything. On day six, we did 15 peaks (57 total in 6 days), a 30-km day with 2,800 vertical meters that left us spent and electrified. We chased good weather, avoided deep snow where possible, and learned to prefer “do something” over “wait for perfect.”
I remember a line from the diary where I wondered whether to slow down and savour the mountains or to keep the momentum. I’d set out to do the project within a year and planned for the seasons. But the first weeks had another plan: I liked going fast. Still, the mind notes that to go far, you sometimes must slow down.
DAY 17–25 — Peak 132, 144, 151… long days and longer laughs
There were days of ridiculous logistics and glorious light. One day, we covered almost 40 km and spent 20 hours traversing mountain terrain, including Veobrean, and finished across a moonscape in the dark. On another, a photo caption reads: “If you’re fond of a sea of loose rocks and boulders in steep terrain, then copy my circuit.” The humour kept us human. We celebrated tiny wins: a good cup of coffee on a ridge, a perfectly timed weather window, a sunset that made tired faces look like saints.
But the diary is candid about the cost. By day 25, I’d written: we burn on average 8–9,000 kcal per day, and there’s basically no way to replenish that. I’d lost weight and strength; the body was a dwindling battery. The honest entry: “I need to recover before my body breaks.” So, I took a scheduled pause: one more peak, a trip home, food, strength training, and then back out. That break saved weeks of potential injury.
The basecamp method — how we actually planned it
The diary explains the logistics in plain, practical terms: set up a strategic basecamp (German Camp in Leirdungsdalen is one example), do daily loops to collect summits, then return to sleep, refuel and repeat. Weather planning and conservative route choice turned out to be the single most important risk-management habit. The basecamp approach is boring on paper and genius in practice.
Late July — Rondane, sickness, and the temper of weather
At one point, I had a one-week hiatus: I was flat in bed with a virus. The diary entry is unapologetic: those tiny bastards can halt even the most tornado-level of motivation. I recovered, only to be hit by weather that felt like an exam: slushy, icy, white-outs. Rondane turned into Bambi-on-ice days; pace slowed, and the project became about smart choices rather than bravado. A diary note reads: “The weather will continue to test us… but I don’t believe in luck, so we plan smart.”
The +200 milestone — Breheimen and character building
Day 39: +200 peaks. We’d planned a Breheimen traverse, and the forecast turned nasty — 20 m/s winds, ice on ridges. Still, we bagged all the objectives. The diary calls it “character building.” When you read those lines, you feel the soot in the lungs and the satisfaction of having forced yourself through. The lesson repeated: know when to pause for safety, know when to push because conditions and energy align.
Hurrungane — the turning moment (and the moment a record started to feel possible)
Hurrungane was technical, beautiful, and brutal. We knocked all 38 Hurrungane 2000m peaks in three days. The diary reads like someone trying to breathe while describing a punch to the gut — exhausted, aching, almost delirious with gratitude. I thanked Mats Sagbakken for being “strong as an ox, skilled like a mountain guide,” because he was. The three-day blitz was a turning point: after it, the record felt within reach. And the cost? Knees that screamed and nights of trying to sleep while agony ebbed and flowed.
Mid-project realities — winter sneaks in, partners matter
The mountains gave us white-out conditions, new snow, and icy rocks. On one day, we opted not to attempt Vesle Galdhøpiggen because the risk of icy rocks didn’t justify the reward. I learned to choose plan B more often, and to value partners who knew when to push and when to say, “No.” Ivar Marthinusen, Sebastian Jonsson, Erik Grek and others feature throughout the diary as stabilisers — people who shared routes and loads and lifted morale with jokes and precise crampon work.
The gamble on Slettmarkshøe S2 — trusting your gut
One entry reads like a mini-thriller: white-out navigation, a gamble on a western glacier without full ice gear, a precarious slippery wall on the ridge and a “way down back to safety [that] was borderline bad.” We made the choice to push, and we were lucky. That day taught me that experience matters, but so does the humility to accept luck as a factor. I wrote: “I trusted my stomach, and we gambled…” — language that captures the precise mix of confidence and hedged risk that keeps you alive.
The last phase — 360, 364, 373, 376… the finish line approaching
By day 64 I’d hit 360 peaks. The final weeks were equal parts awe and pain. “Everything in my body hurts,” an entry says, and then goes on to explain why I still climb: because I promised myself to embrace the pain, to reject the modern fetish for ease. I also wrote gratitude: Sindre’s help, George joining for Falketind, Erik’s companionship when pain was unbearable. Those small social stitches were the final threads that kept the whole tapestry from falling apart.
The night before the last summit — silence, thanks, a single breath
Day 67: 376 summits. “ONLY ONE SUMMIT LEFT!” the diary records, then dissolves into meditation: absorbing atmosphere, remembering the support from partners, family, sponsors and followers. The post was raw: an aching gratitude and a sense of disbelief. The final summit — Urdadalstinden SV2 — would be a quiet last act after a summer of noise, comeback and life affirmation. I cannot fully express the weight that both landed upon me and lifted from me as I touched the cairn on that unassuming summit, standing quietly in the middle of an ocean of towering 2000-metre peaks. I gazed across the horizon, and in every direction, memories stirred — each ascent a chapter, each ridge a lesson, each storm a reminder of how fragile and precious life’s lifeline truly is. In those moments, I felt my adventurous spirit rekindle, like an ember carried through wind and snow, now glowing again.
It was a strange mix of emotions that washed over me as I sat in the stillness: part contentment, part sadness. What an incredible journey it had been. Had someone told me on July 1st that I would climb all of Norway’s 2000-metre peaks in just 68 days, I would never have believed them. I could not have fathomed the true gravity of such a mission — the toll, the beauty, the sheer immensity of it all. And yet, here I was: tired, weathered, peaceful, and deeply grateful.
On that summit, it became a half-hour of silent gratitude — a thank-you speech delivered not to an audience, but to the mountains, the companions, and to life itself. It was also a farewell, a gentle closing of a chapter. No new plans rushed in, no youthful hunger for the “next” thing. Instead, there was only gratitude for the chance to live my dream, unpulled by other strings, guided by my own compass. I was, in that moment, my own general. Time was my possession. And I was content.
Lessons the mountains taught me (short, sharp, practical) — drawn from the diary
- Basecamp + loops = sustainability. Set up, loop, return, rest. It sounds dull, but it keeps knees and minds usable.
- Energy math is brutal. Expect 8–9,000 kcal/day burn in big mountain days; plan logistics accordingly or take a pause.
- Partners matter more than ego. Good partners know when to push and when to hold you back. Sebastian, Ivar and Mats saved days and probably months.
• Weather will always be a character. Read forecasts, then be ready to change chapters when the weather writes a different script. - Technical gambles require humility. The Slettmarkshøe S2 gamble worked once; don’t let success morph into arrogance.
Final lines — why this mattered beyond a stopwatch
Records are shorthand for larger stories: reinvention, community, witnessing place before it changes. I have been to over ninety countries and climbed across continents, and still, Norway’s peaks shocked me with their beauty and variety. This run was a way of saying yes to life after a very public falling apart on K2. It was a way to prove to myself that trouble is not always the end — sometimes trouble is a test you survive and learn from.
If you want the raw captions, full footage, or exact post transcripts from the diary I used, they’re all in my IG account https://www.instagram.com/fredrik.strang/. The diary entries above are drawn verbatim and paraphrased directly from the entries.
With humility, humour, and a sore pair of knees — thank you to everyone who walked even a few metres of this with me. To the next person who feels mountains calling: go. The mountains will teach you things you didn’t know you needed.
Fun footnote for the curious reader: Hurrungane — that three-day blitz — is a compact, technical playground: steep ridges, sudden weather, and rock that keeps you honest. If you ever visit, bring both patience and a good partner. And if you become obsessed with lists and peaks, beware: the mountains will always find a way to teach you humility.
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About Fredrik Sträng:
Fredrik, in his leadership role, has summited seven of the world’s fourteen 8,000-meter peaks, set a Guinness World Record, and lectures on leadership, communication, decision-making, and crisis management.
Kind regards,
Fredrik Sträng
Climber – Speaker – Coach
