Kjell Kristian Rike (12 July 1944 – 19 May 2008) was a Norwegian

sports commentator In sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real-time commentary of a game or event, usually during a live broadcast, traditionally delivered in the historical present tense. Radio was ...

, originally from

Byglandsfjord Byglandsfjord is a village in Bygland municipality in Agder county, Norway. The village is located in the Setesdal valley along the Norwegian National Road 9 and the river Otra in the far southern part of the municipality, just north of the border ...

. He reported on

biathlon The biathlon is a winter sport that combines cross-country skiing and rifle shooting. It is treated as a race, with contestants skiing through a cross-country trail whose distance is divided into shooting rounds. The shooting rounds are not tim ...

events for

NRK NRK, an abbreviation of the Norwegian ''Norsk Rikskringkasting Aksjeselskap, AS'', generally expressed in English as the Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation, is the Norwegian government-owned radio and television public broadcasting company, and ...

starting in 1977, and also on

cross-country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing where skiers rely on their own locomotion to move across snow-covered terrain, rather than using ski lifts or other forms of assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreation ...

from 1985. He was a commentator during several

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

world championships A world championship is generally an international competition open to elite competitors from around the world, representing their nations, and winning such an event will be considered the highest or near highest achievement in the sport, game, ...

, and also at

golf Golf is a club-and-ball sport in which players use various clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a course in as few strokes as possible. Golf, unlike most ball games, cannot and does not use a standardized playing area, and coping wi ...

cycling Cycling, also, when on a two-wheeled bicycle, called bicycling or biking, is the use of cycles for transport, recreation, exercise or sport. People engaged in cycling are referred to as "cyclists", "bicyclists", or "bikers". Apart from two ...

track and field athletics Track and field is a sport that includes Competition#Sports, athletic contests based on running, jumping, and throwing skills. The name is derived from where the sport takes place, a running track and a grass field for the throwing and some of ...

shooting Shooting is the act or process of discharging a projectile from a ranged weapon (such as a gun, bow, crossbow, slingshot, or blowpipe). Even the acts of launching flame, artillery, darts, harpoons, grenades, rockets, and guided missiles can ...

harness racing Harness racing is a form of horse racing in which the horses race at a specific gait (a trot or a pace). They usually pull a two-wheeled cart called a sulky, or spider, or chariot occupied by a driver. In Europe, and less frequently in Australi ...

, and

alpine skiing Alpine skiing, or downhill skiing, is the pastime of sliding down snow-covered slopes on skis with fixed-heel bindings, unlike other types of skiing ( cross-country, Telemark, or ski jumping), which use skis with free-heel bindings. Whether for ...

events. Rike was member of the original staff of the long-running TV series '' Norge rundt'' in 1976, and is credited for having suggested the signature tune for the program, "Norsk dans nr. 2" by

Edvard Grieg Edvard Hagerup Grieg ( , ; 15 June 18434 September 1907) was a Norwegian composer and pianist. He is widely considered one of the foremost Romantic era composers, and his music is part of the standard classical repertoire worldwide. His use of ...

. He was an active sport shooter and a Norwegian champion in 1974. He died on 19 May 2008, about a month after he was diagnosed with terminal

lung cancer Lung cancer, also known as lung carcinoma (since about 98–99% of all lung cancers are carcinomas), is a malignant lung tumor characterized by uncontrolled cell growth in tissue (biology), tissues of the lung. Lung carcinomas derive from tran ...

. He married his longtime partner, Marit Rosendahl, just a few days after being diagnosed.

Awards

*2007

Gullruten Gullruten ("Golden Screen") is an annual award for the Norwegian TV industry, founded in 1998 by ''Norske Film- og TV-produsenters forening''. The awarding committee has representatives from the major national TV companies, NRK, TV 2, TV3 and TV ...

honorary Norwegian TV industry award (with fellow television sports commentator

Jon Herwig Carlsen Jon Herwig Carlsen (15 April 1937 – 10 April 2022) was a Norwegian sports commentator. Career Born on 15 April 1937, Carlsen grew up in Oslo, and was a teacher by education. He worked for NRK from 1967 to 2011, first in the traffic section, ...

References

1944 births 2008 deaths People from Bygland Norwegian television personalities Norwegian male sport shooters Norwegian skiing and biathlon commentators NRK people Norwegian sports journalists Deaths from lung cancer Deaths from cancer in Norway 20th-century Norwegian journalists {{Norway-journalist-stub