Planica World Cup skiing on channels 22.2.–5.3.2023. See the program and broadcast information of the World Ski Championships in this link.
The Under-20 World Championships organized since 1977 have been a springboard to stardom for many Finnish winter sports hopefuls.
Especially in ski jumping, the youth World Cup gold has been refined into adult success for the majority of Finns, as in 1981 in Schonach, who celebrated the youth championship Matti Nykäne.
Many hill jumpers have grown up in modest circumstances, but to few have the junior world championship meant as much as to the Czechoslovak Martin Švagerko.
– The Czechoslovak Ski Federation rewarded me for the World Championship gold with a gift card, which I used to buy a refrigerator for my parents, Švagerko recalls the Trondheim Games organized in February 1984 for Urheilu.
The gold medal earned Švagerko a place on the Czechoslovak Olympic team, which competed the same week at the Sarajevo Olympics on the normal hill. Švagerko was 42nd By Jens Weissflog won in the competition, where Nykänen got silver and Jari Puikkonen bronze.
Švagerko no longer had anything to do with the suurmäki competition held a few days later, where his countryman Pavel Ploc achieved bronze. Nykänen celebrated gold.
The gold and silver medals at the Olympics were not enough for Nykä to be selected as Finland’s Athlete of the Year in 1984. The following year, the golden eagle received that title as well. Nykänen won the World Championship gold on the flying hill, jumped two world records and achieved team gold and bronze on the normal hill at the World Championships in Seefeld.
The last mentioned normal hill competition was colored by the renewal of the first round. The biggest loser was Švagerko, who jumped the top jump, who would have been in the medal fight for the first time.
Instead of bitterness, Švagerko’s vocabulary includes gratitude, which also includes Nykänen as an essential part.
– All sorts of things were written about Mat, but for me he was a professional athlete. He was exceptional and knew what he wanted.
Švagerko says that he still cherishes the memory of Nykäse, which takes place in the Gstaad World Cup in Switzerland in February 1986.
According to Švagerko, Nykänen gave him the wristwatch he got from the 1981 World Youth Championship gold because the Finnish star thought the award was worthless. A more detailed description of the situation does not come to mind, but according to Švagerko, alcohol has no part in it.
– I keep that story to myself. For me, the watch is a beautiful memory of Mati.
A strange bird from the other side of Czechoslovakia
Martin Švagerko was born in Banska Bystricá in the eastern part of Czechoslovakia in October 1967.
When Švagerko was a child, a sports high school was founded in a city the size of Joensuu, and Švagerko became the first Olympic athlete in Sarajevo in 1984.
Švagerko also broke other boundaries in his career. On Thursday, it was exactly 30 years since Švagerko won independent Slovakia’s first medal in Olympic sports.
Czechoslovakia had ceased to exist on January 1, 1993, and neither the Czech Republic nor Slovakia, which became independent from it, had had time to form their own national skiing associations before the World Championships in Falun began.
The team made up of three Czechs and Švargerko won silver in the team hill, from which both countries got their own medal in the medal table. It is still the only adult competition medal achieved by a Slovakian athlete in Nordic skiing.
Skier Alena Procházková got to fight for a medal in the 2011 WC sprint, but didn’t get closer than sixth place. In men’s ski jumping, Slovakia’s previous World Cup points are from December 2005, the women’s point account has yet to be opened.
– The situation in Slovakia is not rosy. Fortunately, we have at least one representative in Planica, says Švagerko, referring to the 16-year-old promise to Tamara Mesíková.
Gone are the days when Švagerko kept Slovakian ski jumping afloat. In addition to the team silver at the World Championships in Falun, Švagerko’s CV also includes the team bronze in the colors of Czechoslovakia from the 1989 Lahti World Championships.
Despite the two World Cup medals and the individual World Cup victory in Chamonix in 1986, Švagerko is not mentioned in the lists found on the Internet, which name the most famous athletes of Banska Bystrica, known for its hockey players and soccer players.
If Švagerko had been born on the Czech side of the border, he would probably have received a different appreciation.
Czechoslovak hillmen were a tough word in those years when success hit the spot. In 1968, in the Czechoslovak Sportsman of the Year voting, the normal mountain who won the Olympic gold Jiří Raškan only the gymnast who brought four Olympic golds from the Mexico Olympics was wedged ahead Věra Čáslavská.
After this, both of the country’s ski jumping value competition wins, Karel Kodejška the 1975 lentomaki World Championship gold and Jiří Parman the 1987 normal hill world championship, were enough for Czechoslovakia’s Sportsman of the Year title.
– Even though I didn’t win the gold medal, I only have good memories. I thank the boys with whom I got to grow up and see the world, Švagerko refers especially to Parma and his other Czech colleagues.
Witnessed the fall of communism
Although Švagerko’s dream of a gold medal in the adult category did not come true, during her jumping career she got to experience things that are palpably more important than sports.
Švagerko arrived in Prague from a competitive trip just as the mass demonstrations that led to the fall of the Communist regime in Czechoslovakia began in November 1989.
– The rest of the team had gone home, but my bus didn’t leave for the Slovak side to Banská until the next morning. Abroad, there was no information about what was happening in Czechoslovakia, and I was startled when the streets of Prague were full of people shouting anti-communist slogans.
– I joined the crowd at Wenceslas Square and saw (the future president of the Czech Republic) Václav Havel speaking to the audience. I will never forget that day and the atmosphere. When I traveled to Banská Bystrica in the morning, the demonstrations continued there as well. People had had enough of communism, Švagerko recalls.
Švagerko did not miss the system, which had time to show him its dark side. According to Švagerko, the Czechoslovak team management confiscated his passport at the World Cup in Falun because an anonymously sent tip suggested that Švagerko was planning to defect. However, after the hearings, the matter did not lead to further measures.
– I never found out who this nameless entity was.
Health first
After his jumping career ended in 1994, Švagerko, 55, has worked as a sports equipment dealer and in his spare time has helped Slovak children interested in hill jumping. Otherwise, he is reluctant to open up his private life in more detail.
– I made exercise programs for children until the beginning of the pandemic, until the authorities forbade us to exercise. Since then, I have also worked abroad at times, so it was time for me to leave the role of Slovakia’s ski jumping torch bearer.
At Švagerko’s request, the interview has been conducted as an e-mail exchange, because according to his own words, the English language is not one of his strong areas. In Švagerko’s messages, the Slovak word vďačnosť, which means gratitude, is often repeated. He connects that not only to his experiences but also to his health.
In the 1980s, dozens of life-threatening accidents were seen in ski jumping, when the speeds were high and the hill profiles were steep, and there were no measurement systems like today to monitor wind conditions.
One of the saddest races was seen in Kulm, Austria in 1986, when Masahiro Akimoto, Ulf Findeisen and Rolf Åge Berg hit the downhill slope like a ragdoll in the lentomäki MM competitions.
– I also had serious falls, but nothing so drastic that I couldn’t continue my career. However, Kulm’s competition left its mark. I wouldn’t call it fear, but survival instinct. Before, the jury used to jump us into wind conditions that would be unheard of nowadays.
When Švagerko started his career, the ski jumping world record was held by his compatriot Pavel Ploc at 183 meters. When Švagerko’s career ended in 1994, the ME readings had shifted Espen Bredesen to name, 209 meters. Since 2017, the world record has stood by Stefan Kraft 253.5 meters.
– The profile of the hills today is such that flying takes place at a lower level. When the equipment side has developed at the same time, the sport has become safer and thereby maintained its attractiveness.
– I am grateful that I was able to finish healthy and that nowadays I can go on a bike ride, hike in the mountains or swim in the lake. My health is everything to me.
The men’s ski jumping normal hill competition is scheduled for Saturday at 18:00 at the World Championships in Planica.