You can no longer change the running direction right before the race, even if the wind conditions are better on the other side of the stadium.
Some of the track and field athletes who arrived in Lahti for the Kaleva Games had understood that for sprinting and horizontal jumping, they would seek optimal conditions in all situations, i.e. a tailwind. Chairman of the organizing committee Pekka Mäki-Reinikka said this out loud on Thursday at a media conference where, among others, Finland’s number one sprinter was present Samuli Samuelsson.
When this did not happen, Samuelsson, who ran second in the 100-meter final on Friday, opened his verbal casket, for example In an interview with Iltalehti.
Samuelsson considered that even the places applied for through the ranking to the World Championships in Budapest may depend on the choice of the organizers. You get compensation points for headwinds in sprints and hurdles and horizontal jumps if the headwind is one meter per second or more. In the final against Satanen on Friday, the wind was 0.8 meters per second.
Similar criticism was given by the winner of the long jump with a score of 773 Kristian Pulli. He would have clearly needed a stronger result for his World Championship ranking.
– I came to this race with a good mood, as my condition has been on the rise. The race organizers could take a look in the mirror, since you could easily change the direction of the jump here. The headwind is quite a poison for us light-built jumpers, Pulli said according to STT.
The weather was chilly
The road was very rough, which means that achieving a result that would promote the journey to the World Cup would have been difficult anyway.
The last word on the running and jumping directions belongs to the judges’ council of the games, which works closely with the organizers. Chairman of the Council Ari Honkanen had become familiar with Samuelsson’s criticism.
– We are not here to make trouble for the athletes, but we try to guarantee them optimal conditions in every situation. We prefer to leave public commenting to the competition organization.
Deadline is one and a half hours
Honkanen reminded that quick last-minute reactions to air currents are not possible due to, for example, Urheilu’s television requirements.
– An hour and a half before the competition is the deadline.
According to the chairman, in this time, the situation can improve where it was moved away from – and deteriorate where it was moved to.
– We are not forecasters and I am not a meteorologist. Optimum is sought for athletes all the time, even now many machines here have the weather radar open. In the long jump, already today (Saturday), the direction of the acceleration was changed.
The women’s 100m final was run against a 0.4m headwind on Friday.
Wind lottery arena
Chairman of the organizing committee Pekka Mäki-Reinikka commented to Urheilu that the Lahti stadium is quite a wind lottery arena due to its geographical location.
– I (on Friday) didn’t hear lamentation chants from more than a hundred men. What is telling is that there was a 0.8 blowing against it, while at the exact same time there was a 0.4 downwind at the adjacent long jump place.
According to Mäki-Reinika, even changing the running direction on Friday would not have helped Samuelsson’s goal to increase his ranking points account.
– There was also a headwind on the back straight. It is due to the shape of the stadium and the environment: the wind here rotates between the ridges.