Original photo by Pavel1964/ Shutterstock
Marathons are one of the most difficult tests of human endurance ever devised. Training your body to run 26.2 miles requires constant practice and determination. Running a marathon at midnight would seem to make a hard task even harder, but that’s exactly what happens every June in the Norwegian town of Tromsø, one of the world’s northernmost cities. Thankfully, its position some 200 miles north of the Arctic Circle gives the marathoners a distinct advantage — because even in the middle of the night when the race takes place, the sun is still shining in Tromsø.
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It's a factNorway is the Winter Olympics king. The Scandinavian country has more than 400 medals — 75 more than the U.S. in second place. It certainly helps that Norway essentially invented skiing, including events like ski jumping and slalom.
From May 21 to July 21, Tromsø experiences constant daylight, meaning that one “day” technically lasts around 1,600 hours. This particular race, fittingly named the Midnight Sun Marathon, draws some 6,000 participants and takes place around the summer solstice, when the sun’s vertical rays strike their northernmost position over the Tropic of Cancer. Tromsø — and other cities and towns north of the Arctic Circle — experience these long stretches of day in the summer (and long stretches of night in winter) because of the Earth’s axial tilt. The Northern Hemisphere is tilted toward the sun during the northern summer, and these northern cities catch the sun’s rays even when the star is shining on the other side of the Earth. But while the Midnight Sun Marathon is certainly a special event, Tromsø has no plans for some sort of “High Noon Moon” marathon during the winter solstice. That’s probably a good idea, since daytime highs in December never reach north of freezing temperatures.
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The world’s northernmost town is ______, located on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.
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The world’s northernmost town is Longyearbyen, located on Norway’s Svalbard archipelago.
Norway has more electric cars per capita than any other country.
Norway is one of the most advanced countries in the world, and when it comes to tackling climate change, it doesn’t take a back seat. In fact, Norway has the highest percentage of electric cars on the road compared to any other country. A 2021 survey found that of all the cars on Norway’s roads, 15.5% of them were electric vehicles (EVs). To put that in perspective, in the Netherlands — the country with the second-highest EV adoption — electric vehicles made up only about 2.8% of cars on the road. Since then, Norway’s numbers have only improved. The New York Times reports that in 2022, 80% of all vehicles sold in Norway were electric cars, by far the highest of any country. Norway is so ahead of the electrification game (by some estimates a full decade ahead of the U.S.) primarily because it began investing in battery-powered vehicles in the 1990s and heavily subsidized the construction of fast chargers and the adoption of EVs more generally.
Darren Orf lives in Portland, has a cat, and writes about all things science and climate. You can find his previous work at Popular Mechanics, Inverse, Gizmodo, and Paste, among others.
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