Ski Team Göhlin’s Pro Team Director Simon Jonsson tells how the team got started and what investing in long-distance skiing means for the ski community in the Småland area. 

“The idea about starting a team began in the gym basement of our club house (IF Hallby SOK, which is the ski club I also compete for). I was there training with the Rosjö brothers (who now also compete in Ski Team Göhlins and Eksjöhus) when the thought ‘wouldn’t it be cool with a Småland ski team’ hit me,” Jonsson explains. 

Together with a ski enthusiast and a friend, Isak Nilsson, who is now responsible for the team’s marketing, Jonsson started to build Team Göhlins around the Småland ski community. 

The team consists of skiers from Southern Sweden. Jonsson was born in 1998 as their oldest member, as other skiers in the group were born in 1999 or 2000. 

Ski Team Göhlins: 

• Simon Jonsson (Athlete & Pro Team Director – 1998) 
• Elias Andersson (2000)
• Filip Rosjö (2000)
• Hanna Lodin (1999)
• Hilda Löf (2000)

“As a team, we have a strong local connection to Småland and our base, Gnosjö. Right now, Elias (Andersson) and I live there and cheer each other on in training and other things. The other skiers live in slightly different places. Filip is currently studying in Östersund, as are Hilda in Stockholm and Hanna in Umeå.” 

The team has had two official gatherings over the summer. Still, as all members live in the South of Sweden, they have also been able to train together in between, and the team has participated in a rollerski cup in the Gnosjö region. Additionally, some team members competed in Alliansloppet, Tanumsloppet, Värnamorullen, and Vaajmarathon, which are all Ski Classics Challengers competitions.  

For the upcoming season, the young goal-oriented team aims to take in as much as possible; to learn, to enjoy, but also to perform:

“The goal for the coming season is to have extreme fun together and improve our results compared to last year. We will step up our efforts this season. I won’t say exactly which competitions will be, but most of them.”

“Our long-term goal is to be one of the world’s best long-distance teams in a few years. There is a long way to go, but with absolutely no impossibility.” 

Jonsson believes that a good atmosphere and help from the community will show in the results: 

“We all have individual goals to perform better than the previous season. Individual performance goals are always difficult because they depend on many different things. Hilda has the ambition to stay in the top 30 in the big races and participate and fight at the front in the Swedish long-distance cup. Hanna’s goal is to develop as much as possible and dreams of being in the top 10 in one of the races. Filip is aiming for the top 50 at Vasaloppet. Elias and I have had a rough pre-season, making it difficult to set any direct performance goals.” 

Not only the team has some of the youngest athletes in the Pro Tour, but also young service staff: 

“We stand out from the other teams with our young age and show that it is possible to run a Pro Team even in younger days. Even the service staff is at a young age where we have Karl Stark (Head Wax Technician), born in 2001, and Petter Persson, born in 1998. We have a lot of fun together, which is our strength.”