Father Tero Palosaari still remember it like it was yesterday. Kuusamo’s Erä-Veikot once again started running a children’s hill school in the city center on the so-called Meijer junior hill. Tero Palosaari took his five-year-old son Vilhon to the hill in the sense that the first time we look and if it looks pleasant, the second time we put on our skis.
– Yes, it was love at first sight. After every jump, the boy ran, his eyes glazed over, to jump again. He saw that he had found his own kind.
For Vilho Palosaari, now 19, the memory may not be as clear.
– But I have a memory that it immediately had something completely different from anything else I had tried. I was immediately hooked on the sport, Palosaari recalls about 14 years later in Nastola.
The national team jumpers have just finished a great physical exercise in the gym of Pajulahti sports college in the early evening; went jumping in Lahti in the morning.
Even if the group sweats too Antti Aalton and Eetu Nousiainen like Finnish jumpers who have had the best international success in recent years, the biggest interest in the current representative group is without a doubt directed at Palosaari, who made his debut at the adult competition level last winter at the World Championships in Planica.
A sensation in Whistler
However, the youngster from North-Eastern Finland is on the lookout for the Junior World Championships held in Whistler, Western Canada. From there, on February 2, Palosaari won the gold medal in the normal hill jumping competition, 0.6 points ahead of Austria Jonas Schuster. The five jumpers after the gold medalist all came from either Austria or Poland.
Whereas top success in the youth World Championships was commonplace for Finnish boys for decades, now Palosaari became the first champion in 18 years. The predecessor ie Joonas Ikonen did not break through to the top in adults. They also won the individual gold medal before Palosaari Checkmate A twitch, Ari-Pekka Nikkola, Toni Nieminen, Janne Ahonen twice, Brother Matti Lindström and Janne Happonen.
Everyone had a brilliant or at least excellent career as an adult as well. The last mentioned Happonen currently sews the jump suits of Vilho Palosaari.
The game changed
Janne Ahonen, Urheilu’s current sports expert, also followed Palosaari’s training in Pajulahti with interest from the sidelines. He considers Palosaari to be on a very good path towards adult success, but the five-time mountain week winner also calls for patience. From the list of Finnish jumpers listed above, many were also top adults already when they won the junior WC gold.
– That game completely changed twenty years ago, when the BMI index was added to the sport, Ahonen recalls.
The new index rule meant that a table was written about the relationship between the jumper’s height and weight. Jumpers who were considered too underweight had to use shorter skis than before, which of course directly affected the length of the jumps. Behind it was the International Ski Federation’s concern about the sport’s reputation and even health risks.
– Around the same time, attention was also paid to oversized jumpsuits for the first time. The jumper who was successful at the Junior World Championships might have been an ultralight glider with maximum length skis on his feet. That advantage was taken away then, Ahonen, who achieved his own youth World Championship gold 30 years ago, recalls.
Vilho Palosaari says that his head is not in the clouds, even though the World Championship gold is in the display case at home.
– That victory was a great thing in itself and showed that we are on the right path. But it has been a long time and there is no more help, says Palosaari, who is very interested in his sport and also has a good command of its history.
Good physics
His sports mobility is at a very good level, and during the training season that is ending, there has been a drastic physical development. The head coach of the national team who took over Palosaari’s coaching responsibility in 2021 Lauri Hakola speaks of a total development of up to 15 percent. From the so-called sport angle, Palosaari lifts 150 kilos from the leg squat, which is a good international standard, about 2.5 times the jumper’s own weight. In the power plate effort, he rises to a height of more than 60 centimeters from the ground.
– As far as I understand, it would correspond to an increase of 65-66 cents with the contact mat used in our time, which is good, Ahonen states.
Finns have at least increased by more than 70 cents in the contact mat test Mika LaitinenAhonen and Ville Larintoand Palosaari approaches the same level.
Palosaari has heard enough talk that he is, as it were, the last hope of Finnish ski jumping. He says he doesn’t care about them. The sport is not about hard bets and the sport leader Mika Kojonkoski despite being hired, is back on the track of success.
– Vilho is so young that the history of the sport is not a burden to him, because he doesn’t even remember it. Then the group that is 6–7 years older than him has been in a more difficult situation in that sense, Ahonen, who has jumped seven Olympic Games, knows.
During the training season, the national team, which trained mainly at home, also went to camp in Lillehammer, Norway. Palosaari watched the world championships with a keen eye Halvor Egner Granerud, Marius Lindvik and Daniel-Andre Tande operated on the hill.
“Relaxed mood”
– It seemed like a pretty relaxed mood. Between jumps, they watched videos for a long time and could even drink coffee before returning to the tower. Seemed stress-free and unhurried. We have a bit of the mentality that we go between the tower and the tower in a terrible hurry, when we should be enjoying the work a little, Palosaari laughs.
The skiing association has made a clear policy that the representative group trains mainly in Kuopio under the supervision of the national team coaches. In the current resource situation, the solution is understood on the other hand, but for example, having coached Palosaari in Kuusamo Antti Koivuranta fears that it will weaken the sport in other mountain centers even more.
– Maybe that’s not where the appreciation of social work is at its peak, says Koivuranta, who collaborated particularly intensively with Palosaari in 2019–2021.
Hard physical training also started at that time.
– Vilho is grateful to be coached in the same way that he is a guy who is completely unafraid of work. Does all the basic tasks with a tough attitude and is not afraid of new stimuli.
When he was a boy, Palosaari from Kuusamo used to go jumping a lot in Taivalkoski, 65 kilometers away, where you could find hills of the right size for a middle-aged man, unlike his home in Ruka.
– I have driven one Volvo machine to the end in the boy’s jumping work, Tero Palosaari calculates.
With head coach Lauri Hakola, Palosaari is now preparing for the competition season for the third time. The native of Kuusamo moved to Kuopio at the age of 16 on his own because there was practically no other option if he was interested in A national team activities.
Not a Koben bull
– Everyday life was not a problem; mother had taught all the household chores, cooking and the like, along with ski jumping at her own pace, the promise, who is studying for a degree in mercantile economics, praises her household.
Kobenhärkä Palosaari does not place. In practice, the main source of income is the 6,000-euro athlete grant from the Ministry of Education. The Ski Federation has not collected deductibles from the A national team training and camp.
The starting points for success at the Youth World Cup in the spring of 2022 were not favorable, as a worsening and painful stress injury to the knee forced Palosaari to substitute training for months. In the end, the injury did not require surgery.
– The tests showed tendon and bone damage, so the game was called off in the spring. Vilho wasn’t really able to train anything striking or maximum strength during the summer. But on the other hand, he trained a lot in body control, recalls Hakola, and in addition, sports director Kojonkoski actively participates in the coaching of Palosaari.
Although Palosaari is a bright spark of hope for Finnish ski jumping, we are still talking about an athlete who has only twice placed in the top 30 in the World Cup individual competition.
– Vilho’s väumämäki landing position is aggressive and, so to speak, he is very much on top of the landing. You don’t see the back-heavy swagger anymore, and the man generally has such a good mood for swaggering. But unfortunately, it sometimes also shows up as too fast action in the effort phase, which so-called snaps up. The next big development target is the optimal utilization of the physics, which has gone in a very good direction, through a longer effort movement, says Hakola.
Palosaari sees itself among the world champions in a couple of years.
– The Milan Olympic Games is an event that comes to mind quite often. I guess you can say that out loud.