The banana leaves smell from afar. It’s Tuesday evening in the northern parts of Mariehamn, and the Donner family’s dinner is about to be prepared. Three years old Kira help dad About Andrea breaking eggs into a bowl. Big brother a couple of years older Victor sitting on the couch reading a Bamse comic.
Marina Donner has just returned from table tennis training and gets to step onto the almost fully set table fresh from the shower.
Donner states that his sports career would not be possible without a strong safety net and an understanding family, and emphasizes the signal it sends.
– Is it seen as natural for a mother to go to training or a race trip as if it were a father? Do people still wonder that “oh, you travel a lot, you think about your children”. Or do they think that “well, it’s nice that you’re actually doing all this”, Marina Donner ponders.
This year, Donner has already managed to win three veterans’ WC gold medals in Oman, climb into the top 300 in the world ranking, and lead HIK to the domestic men’s championship series.
Men’s? Indeed. And if you’re wondering if his level is enough, last season’s winning percentage in the first division will give you a clue. The balance was 28 wins and one loss. In the championship series, he has won half of his matches this season.
Marina Donner has made an incredible journey from Siberia to Åland and the Finnish national team jersey at the age of 39. The 41-year-old doctor, who currently ranks 303rd in the world rankings, is Finland’s highest-ranked female table tennis player.
This is all true, even though the peak of the career should have already passed.
The circle closed in Oman in January. Marina Donner made her debut at the World Veterans Championship and swept the prize table in the 40-year-old category, winning both the singles, women’s doubles and mixed doubles.
The singles gold was the most valuable of the three – but the mixed doubles was personally the most important. He won that as a pair Igor Krokhin.
Donner usually plays mixed doubles with his training partner Johan Pettersson, but in the veterans’ World Championships he was lucky to have an old and dear friend.
Marina Donner was born in Omsk, a city of millions in Siberia, and moved to Tuapse on the northeastern coast of the Black Sea with her mother at the age of four.
He was a great tennis talent as a child and excelled as a junior in international tournaments in Kiruna, among others. Even to the extent that, at the age of 15, he received a phone call from northern Sweden. Kiruna’s newly established women’s team needed reinforcement, and the coach recruited a few years earlier called Marina, whom she had taught since she was a little girl.
This coach was Igor Krokhin.
– When we were waiting for our medals behind the podium, we poked each other playfully and said “don’t just start crying now, don’t just start crying now”, Donner recalls an emotional moment at the World Championships in Oman.
– We were really moved. It was such a beautiful story. Childhood coach and coachee on the highest podium.
They represented their new home countries: Sweden and Finland. Russia is a sensitive topic.
Russia changed to Sweden when Donner at the age of 15 received an offer to become a professional ping pong player.
– It sounds really great, but no big money was involved. I got accommodation and food paid for, as well as some pocket money. You don’t need that at that age.
Donner had never thought of settling abroad when he moved to Kiruna as a teenager. However, this is what happened.
In the beginning, in addition to letters, communication with home consisted of one five-minute phone call per month. That’s all Marina’s teacher mother could afford.
– After my mother moved to Åland last year, I no longer have anything that ties me to Russia in the same way. Because of the war, it will take a really long time before I return, says Donner.
Feels the age in his body – but fights against it
– At this point our Johan has to start being careful – the young people are starting to approach!
Marina Donner laughs heartily and passes the spiral ball to the other side of the table standing in the corner of the large gymnasium.
Johan Pettersson has a table reservation at a restaurant for the evening, but when Sportliv wants to film the exercises, he rushes to Donner’s help. As he has done so many times before.
They already played together in Stockholm’s top club Spårvägen, until love gradually brought them both to Åland.
Marina Donner had a handsome career in Sweden. When the country’s multiple championship medalist moved to Åland after 17 years spent in the western neighbor, interest in table tennis decreased. Practice opportunities were limited, and the work of a doctor was rewarding but difficult.
The limited training hours were increasingly filled by a new love for triathlon.
– After my first pregnancy, I needed a carrot to get back in shape. I was afraid that I would become too comfortable, says Donner.
So he decided to complete an Ironman. In November 2018, fifteen months after the birth of her son Viktor, the plan came true.
If you’re sitting on the couch in your 40s and 50s, you can’t expect to be a super-perky 60-year-old.
Marina Donner
Although table tennis has once again replaced triathlon as Donner’s number one sport, the selection of sports has remained in the training selection. He wakes up every weekday morning to either swim, bike or run before the kids wake up and he has to go to work.
A preventive measure to keep the body fit. Because as he states: Nothing comes for free after forty.
– You can’t expect everything to work as before. You have to work to maintain your current level or you will begin to decline.
Donner, who works as a doctor, underlines the importance of daily exercise to his patients. He asks them if they want to be healthy in their 60s and 80s. Most of them answer yes, but not all of them actively work on it.
– If you sit on the sofa at the age of 40-50, you cannot assume that you will become a super cheerful 60-year-old.
He says it’s all about the will. Everyone has to find their own inner motivation. The answer to the question: What exactly do I want?
– If you get your strength from wanting to be able to do five push-ups or run two kilometers – perfect. Then that’s your motivation, Donner says, using brushing his teeth as a metaphor.
– I don’t like brushing my teeth, but I still do it every day because I don’t want my teeth to rot in my mouth when I’m 60. The exact same logic applies to exercise.
Donner says she wants to act as an example for women who worry about how the hours are enough and how the body will last after the age of 30. Once again: Everything depends on the will.
– Like all parents of small children, you often feel inadequate.
He lists that you should read more to children, you should develop yourself at work, you should exercise more.
– I think about it in the way that you can’t have everything, but maybe a little bit of everything.
The first SM gold led to an aha experience
The past few years have offered a streak of success that Marina Donner could never have imagined.
In three years in a row, he has won all three available SM golds. He competes on the world tour among the international elite, a level he never reached in his “first career”. In the veteran competitions, he collects medals and at the same time draws inspiration from 90-year-olds who are still in their prime.
And above all: He has finally gotten to wear the national team uniform.
– I am forever grateful to the association and national team coach Johanna Kaimio for giving me the opportunity.
– Of course, I have earned my place, but perhaps not everyone would dare to choose the 39-year-old.
But everything could just as well have remained unachieved. After moving to Åland, motivation was missing.
The career burned with the flame of savings for several years – until daughter Kira was born in February 2020. The flame was lit, perhaps stronger than ever.
– Only after that I started investing properly.
In autumn 2021, he was crowned Finnish champion for the first time. At the same time, he got the final confirmation he needed that he should still try.
– It was an aha experience for me. It was really exciting to feel that “wow, I can do it!”.
After the second consecutive SM gold, he received an invitation to represent his new home country. The debut came in the EC qualifiers in Sarajevo in the spring of last year.
During the opening ceremony, emotions were unleashed.
– I looked at the tickets and the text Suomi in my hand and thought: I succeeded.