Stig Rune Kveen has been hired as the new coach for the women’s Norwegian elite cross-country skiing national team. Kveen will be working with the new head coach Sjur Ole Svarstad.

In a press release today, the Norwegian Ski Association informed that Stig Rune Kveen (41) will be the coach for the women’s elite in a team with newly appointed head coach Sjur Ole Svarstad. Kveen lives in Meråker and has signed a contract for two years. He will start working with the cross-country women’s team already at the Sognefjells training camp next week.

“To work in a developing team at this level, with the best support staff, is simply a privilege,” says a happy Stig Rune Kveen. 

Kveen thinks it is a bit latent as an ambitious coach to have a dream and a goal of being able to train athletes at the national team level. 

“I am humbled and honored by the opportunity to participate and develop the Norwegian women’s cross-country at the elite level towards a World Championships on Trøndelag soil.” 

“It is also enriching that Sjur Ole Svarstad is the head coach I will work most closely with,” Kveen continues. 

“I know Sjur Ole from the time with Petter Northug, when Svarstad had the role I am going into now, and I experience him as a positive, inclusive and talented person with good energy. Even though we are ‘equally young’, I think we as a coaching team will complement each other with our ‘complementary competence’ as we call it in Trøndelag.” 

The contract was initially signed for two years, and national team coach Sjur Ole Svarstad is looking forward to the collaboration. 

“I think we will be a good team. Despite the “young age,” Stig Rune is a grown man with long experience, commitment, and enthusiasm. He has a long life in cross-country skiing. First as an active, then as a trainer. I think we will complement each other well with the engaging and winning nature. Stig Rune also gets the opportunity to be closer to many skiers who live in Trøndelag,” says Svarstad. 

Former cross-country skier Stig Rune Kveen is originally from Melbu in Vesterålen, and moved to Meråker in 1996. He retired in 2008 after good performances in the ski track: Junior Norwegian champion and as a senior a Norges Cup victory, double Norwegian champion in the relay with Strindheim IL, and 2nd place overall in the Scandinavian Cup. 

He still lives in Trøndelag and now represents IL Varden Meråker. Stig Rune has a wife, two children aged 11 and 12, and sports education and Olympiatoppen’s Top Coach 2. Since 2012 he has been employed as a ski coach and teacher at the ski high school in Meråker with a stay in the ski seasons 2015/2016 and 2016/2017 and was a full-time coach for Petter Northug. 

Cross-country skiing manager Espen Bjervig is pleased with the women elite’s recruitment for the coaching roles. 

“We have great faith in the two we have now appointed and look forward to them starting up already on Sognefjellet,” says the cross-country skiing manager in the press release. 

“In addition, it is gratifying that so many competent and positively committed coaches have been interested in the jobs we have advertised. We are grateful for this and take with us many good relations further in developing Norwegian cross-country skiing,” concludes Espen Bjervig.