Hi, my name is Lasse Kromann and I am a Framerunner from Denmark. In this blogpost I am going to tell you a little bit about what the Framerunning camp and cup is and what it means to me.

Where is home and where do you belong in the world? That is a question we often ask ourselves because we have to belong somewhere right? And when do you know when you have found home? For me I found my home when I first entered the door to the Framerunning camp and cup. When I first attended the camp and cup I had only been running for three months. I felt like Dorothy when she first got to OZ. At first, I was overwhelmed by the people who looked like me and competed at a much higher level. I remember breaking down because I did not like the sound of the starting gun (I still don’t like it). But unlike Dorothy I did not click my heels because this was my new home, I found my tribe. This was one of the first times I felt that I could achieve something.

To give you an idea about how the camp and cup is structured is that there is training for the first two days of camp. At the end of every camp there is a competition that back then only ran for a day (now it is running for three days). My first ever competition was a 1500 meter race, which thinking about it today, is insane. I wouldn’t recommend giving a 1500 meter, 800 meter and 400 meter a go in one day with only three months of practice. Be smart, don’t do what I did. But nevertheless I did it and I somehow managed to win two races and from then on I have competed internationally ever since. Even though I have competed in many international events including The WPA (World Para Athletics), European and World championship, the camp for me is the best event of the year. It is the best event of the year because it combines the element of fierce competition where there is the highest amount of athletes from around the world, with the element of social interaction with people all over the world. This is what makes the camp as special as it is. I have met some of my best friends on the camp and some of the best people I ever met from around the world on the camp. The camp has played a big part of shaping me into the person I am today. The camp is one of the most formative experiences you can be a part of as a Framerunner. It gives you a wider view of what the Framerunning community has to offer. It should be mandatory if you have the funds to do it – to at least try to visit the camp once as a rite of passage.

This year is the 25th anniversary of the camp therefore would like to raise a glass to everyone who made this camp possible. Without all of your contributions to making the camp happen we would not be here today. I would especially like to thank Mansoor Siddiqi for his time and effort into making this camp happen. I think it is important to note that Mansoor works year round on making the camp happen. He is always the first one to get up in the morning and the last one to get to bed in the evening. He has got the biggest engine and the biggest work ethic that I have ever experienced. I just want to say thank you to Mansoor, because I would not be where I am today, and we would not be where we are today if not for him.

To conclude I would like to go back to my opening question: Where is home and where do you belong in the world? We can define home in many different ways. I recently finished watching season three of the TV series POSE. POSE is about the ballroom scene in 1980-1990s New York under the AIDS epidemic. Many of the main characters in the show have to redefine what home is, because many of them don’t have a home, because they got kicked out of the community they are supposed to belong to. Therefore they form their own family and houses where they look out for each other for better or for worse. I am not trying to make a direct comparison to what the main characters in the show are going though. The only way they can survive sticking together through thick and thin and I am in no way comparing what I have gone through with what the main character is going through on the show because many of them are trans persons of color which is a whole other experience of life. The reason why I bring it up anyway is because many of us sometimes don’t really know where we belong in the world. And I think the camp can help people get together and maybe form a chosen family and find our own little corner of the sky. We may don’t have to redefine what home is entirely, but at the same time we don’t have to go back to Kansas because we may already have found our home here in the camp and as previously mentioned, there is no place like home.

If you are a Framerunner, I hope to see you at the camp this year or in the future

Best regards Lasse Kromann