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Running Through History: Alumnus Geir Stian Ulstein’s Journey from Paris to Moscow

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When Norwegian author and historian Geir Stian Ulstein ’04 set out to retrace the legendary 1832 run from Paris to Moscow, he wasn’t trying to break any records. He simply wanted to attempt the incredible feat of his 19th-century compatriot Mensen Ernst, known in his day as “the Running King”, who accomplished the run in 14 days.  

Alongside his friend and co-runner, physician Øyvind Torp, Ulstein completed seven marathons in thirteen days, crossing the continent from France to Russia. His resulting book, Løperkongens Skygge—meaning “in the shadow of the running king”—was published in Norwegian in 2019. It blends travel writing, historical reflection, and personal endurance. The story captures not only the extraordinary pace of the physical journey but also the slow, enduring rhythm of Europe’s past.  

He recalls, “We ran through landscapes marked by Napoleon, by Hitler, by every empire that tried to go from west to east. You feel how short time really is. Twenty years, two hundred years, it’s nothing.” 

Ulstein’s love of history began long before his own adventures. It started with his grandfather, a Norwegian medical student who was arrested during the Second World War and deported to a concentration camp in Germany. While imprisoned, his grandfather dreamed of becoming a writer. In 1999 he passed his two unfinished manuscripts to Ulstein, who eventually turned them into his first book, Barbed Wire Roses. 

Since then, Ulstein has published over a dozen books. About cycling, exploration, and the hidden corners of European history. The thread connecting them all, he says, is curiosity. “I think it’s the same curiosity that drove Mensen Ernst to run from Paris to Moscow. He didn’t have a map, he didn’t even have shoes, just bags on his feet, and yet he found his way.” 

Ulstein’s own world expanded during a semester at The American University of Paris in 2004, where he studied history and architecture as part of his degree from the University of Oslo. 

“I had three choices that year: Cairo, South Africa, or Paris,” he says. “And because of Hemingway, I chose Paris. It’s a cliché, but A Moveable Feast is true: Paris stays with you wherever you go.” 

While studying at AUP, he lived within walking distance of Napoleon’s tomb at Les Invalides. The proximity to history, he says, changed how he experienced the past. Not as something distant, but as something lived. 

“You feel the history in Paris. You’re surrounded by it every day. Studying there taught me to seek new impulses, to challenge myself, and to look for stories that connect the personal and the historical.” 

The idea for the journey took shape when Ulstein discovered Mensen Ernst’s name in a passing reference in the American bestseller Born to Run. Curious, he began researching the nearly forgotten 19th-century athlete who once bet he could run from Paris to Moscow in fifteen days and won. 

Ulstein and his neighbor Øyvind Torp joked that they might one day attempt the same challenge. But the plan changed when Torp was diagnosed with advanced cancer. “He saw his own X-rays and thought he had one year to live. So we said, ‘If you get healthy, we’ll run to Moscow.’ And he did.” 

Torp’s recovery inspired their collaboration on Self-Defense Against Cancer, a book about combining medicine and lifestyle changes. Their next step was the run itself, which was a symbolic continuation of both men’s personal battles with time and endurance. 

Geir Stian Ulstein ‘04 (left) and his running partner Øyvind Torp (right) in Moscow, Russia

“It became a story about impossible things. A man who should have been dead ran seven marathons in thirteen days. We followed another man who should have been forgotten, but whose story still runs through Europe.” 

Their route mirrored the path of conquest and conflict that has shaped Europe for centuries. From Verdun’s fields of remembrance to Weimar’s humanist legacy, Dresden’s ruins, and Kraków’s quiet beauty near Auschwitz, each city carried its own weight of memory. 

In Belarus, the pair ran through the city of Brest under watchful eyes after a tense border crossing, forced to complete their marathon within 24 hours before their visas expired. “It was completely silent, like a sleeping city,” Ulstein recalls. “When we crossed back into Poland, I was incredibly happy. I’ve never felt freedom so strongly.” 

Ulstein and Torp running in Brest, Belarus

In Germany, they crossed the invisible line that once divided East and West and ran along the “Blood Road” near Weimar. Built by prisoners during the war, including some who had been held in the same camp as Ulstein’s grandfather. 

“It felt powerful to run there. Seventy years ago, my grandfather arrived at that camp as a prisoner. We arrived there free. It reminded me how much possibility we have today that they didn’t.” 

Despite heat, injuries, and exhaustion, they completed the journey. Looking back, Ulstein sees the trip as a time capsule; a portrait of Europe just before everything changed. The adventure took place not long before the COVID-19 pandemic and the war in Ukraine. “We measured the temperature of Europe before it shifted. It was the last moment of openness before borders closed and fears came back.” 

Through it all, he found that running offered a new way of reading the continent: “You see the small differences, how one side of the border is rich and the other poor, but also how connected everything still is. You realize Europe is one story told in many voices.” 

What he and Torp chose to do was to reimagine a piece of European history through movement, memory, and endurance. “We always do better than we think is possible, that’s what this adventure taught me.” 

Today, Ulstein continues to write and travel. He is looking for a publisher to translate Løperkongens Skygge into English. "Norwegian is a small language, but I think this book would work well in English if there is a publisher who is interested in translating it. It’s European history told through the body, through running.” 

For AUP alumni, Ulstein’s story is a reminder that the liberal arts can lead anywhere: across borders, through centuries, or even 3,000 kilometers on foot. His journey embodies AUP’s belief in curiosity, creativity, and the courage to think differently. 

Read Geir Stian Ulstein’s work and share your own life updates with AUP here: aup.edu/life-updates.