“The next 24 hours will turn boys into men … and chickens will be slaughtered!”
Thus began the opening speech for the first 24-hour STEP CAMP, where five young talents from STEP Sports Management accepted the invitation to a day filled with unknown challenges, unreasonable demands, and new learning—especially about their own abilities.
The day started gently with an hour and a half of boxing training led by U17 national team boxer Nadja Munkholm, followed by what is perhaps the worst experience for a modern person: two hours of silence without a smartphone, internet, or anything else to focus on except themselves.
Throughout the program, the young talents also learned to prepare for the unknown—this time in the form of an unannounced night run with built-in challenges in a dark forest.
However, the day wasn’t entirely brutal. The exhausted racers enjoyed a nourishing dinner they prepared themselves, and they managed to get several hours of sleep.
The day concluded with a 25-kilometer mountain bike ride in the beautiful nature of Klosterheden. Despite the hardships, smiles were visible on their muddy faces.
-Motorsport is an unpredictable and demanding sport. Especially the mind and one’s mindset are crucial if you want to reach the top of the sport. Therefore, we took the drivers on a trip where we challenged their mindset and allowed them to experience a taste of what the body is capable of handling, said Morten Dons.
-Several of the drivers aim to compete in major endurance races, where you must be fully alert for all 24 hours. That’s why we went for a night run after just a few hours of sleep, where they had to perform both physically and mentally while collaborating to reach the finish line.
Throughout the 24 hours, there were naturally some complaints from the young drivers, but in Dons’ eyes, all five did well:
-Of course, they were dissatisfied, pressured, and frustrated along the way. The important thing was that they defied their exhaustion and irritation and took on the challenges. They gave 100 percent and discovered along the way that the worst discomforts weren’t so bad after all. I hope that after a good night’s sleep, they can feel that they’ve pushed some boundaries and gained new perspectives on what they are capable of.