Kerttu Niskanen34, was the super success of Finland’s female skiers at last winter’s Olympics, but the years before the Beijing Games were sometimes a heaven of pain for her.
The pace did not improve in the following season either, and Niskanen, who had drifted into overexertion, had to take a six-week break in the middle of the busiest competition season.
The difficulties were too much for the coach from Niska For Pekka Vähäsöyring. He was unable to continue a close coaching relationship.
Niskanen knew that the situation was mentally tough for Vähäsöyring, and he could not force anyone to be his coach.
However, help for the situation was found nearby.
When Niskanen changed Lahti in the World Cup spring Jussi Piirainen training under Vähäsöyring’s watchful eyes, he was already thinking about his spouse at that time Juho Mikkonen with whether their coaching relationship could be possible.
Mikkosen had a passion for coaching, but his own sports career was still unfinished. When Vähäsöyrinki gave up coaching Niskanen, the question came up again.
– At no point did I think about other options, Niskanen told Urheilu before the pair’s first competition season.
Niskanen and Mikkonen realized that coaching one’s own spouse can be risky, especially when the person being coached is one of Finland’s toughest and most successful female skiers.
Not all outsiders necessarily understood the solution either. In recent years, Kerttu Niskanen in particular has been able to answer questions about the functionality of coaching and relationships.
The coaching relationship did not test the relationship between Niskanen and Mikkonen, because they immediately made the roles very clear. In training, they are the coach and the coachee, at home they are a couple who focus on ordinary everyday life.
The coaching relationship between two people who are passionate about skiing and competing has proven to work, as Niskanen’s results improved by leaps and bounds in the very next season.
However, Niskanen did not follow a straight path to success in Beijing and today.
Niskanen knows the harsh truth
– This is why you have worked all your life. You are fighting for an Olympic victory. Now you have to hold on! Fight, fight!
Masseur for the cross country team Jari Räisänen runs alongside Kerttu Niskanen on the Olympic track in Zhangjiakou and encourages.
Many agreed to the same encouragement from the couch at home.
Niskanen’s fight and a narrow 0.4 second loss from Olympic gold To Therese Johaugu Almost a year later, the 10-kilometer traditional cross-country ski race still inspired Finns so much that it was awarded third place in the Most Exciting Moment voting at the Sports Gala.
– It took 15 years for Kerttu to achieve his first individual medal. It’s been a hell of a lot of training and sacrifices, Mikkonen stated after the race.
Kerttu Niskanen’s performance on the final stage of the Games, in the 30-kilometer freestyle skiing co-start race, would have been an equally strong candidate for the category “Most thrilling moment”. Johaug took an overwhelming victory before Jessie Digginsbut in the background we could see the great excitement of the bronze medal.
Niskanen ate Ebba Andersson the lead on the last climb of the stadium caught, but Tatjana Sorina got up on the back straight to challenge the Finn. On the front straight, Sorina stopped in the headwind as if against a wall, while Niskanen just increased his speed and took the bronze medal for himself.
– Oh, what skiing from Kerttu Niskas! What skiing! What a battle! mill Kimmo Porttila Ylen’s commentary, and he was right.
Niskanen had to take a break from competition for almost ten months, but came back stronger than ever.
– Juho did a good job in terms of my fitness getting better and better all the time. The time we had was enough. At the Olympics, I was in the best shape and we did everything as well as possible, Niskanen said before the start of this season, recalling what caused his level to rise.
– Breaking my leg took so much from me that I had a really strong desire to show, especially to myself, that I could get to where I wanted to be. The harsh truth is that hard work pays off.
The hard work has continued into this season as well, and it has been reflected in the results.
At the Tour de Ski, Niskanen was second in the overall competition, in the overall results of the World Cup, he is in third place and leads the standard distance cup. The starting points promise good things for Planica’s World Cup skiing.
Niskanen’s training for the past two years has been based on his strength and endurance.
For this season, it has been developed even more so that he would be even harder to ski the uphills and could still work on the climbs, because according to Mikkonen, those are the points where the biggest differences in competitions often come.
Planica’s World Cup tracks offer Niskanen meaningful terrains. Long and gentle climbs that require traditional sliding shift skiing and a lot of “wassu” on the free.
– At least I want to think that they suit me, Niskanen laughed.
Two Gretels – each other’s extremes
Kerttu Niska is often characterized as a child of nature, who is often recognized by her boisterous laugh and affectionate nature. However, affection is far from over when Niskanen gets to the race track.
– If Kerttu bends, he never breaks, but perseveres and fights until the end, Jussi Piirainen, Niskanen’s coach for many years and now responsible for the women’s national team, characterized his former protégé.
So there are two sides to the neck. Civilian-Niskanen is warm-hearted and considerate of others, but when it comes to sportsman-Niskanen, everything is done with one hundred percent concentration and hard work in mind.
The coach doesn’t have to fear for a moment that Niskanen will slip out of the training program, but equally he demands commitment and giving his all from his coach and those around him.
– In many other things you can find two sides, but in Kertu the competitor Kerttu is the extreme, Piirainen assured.
Niskanen’s competitive spirit attracted Piirainen’s attention already at the beginning of the millennium, when the future promise from Vieremä skied in the 17-year-old series. Niskanen was already the strongest skier in his age group and showed that he liked competitions, but above all that he did well in them.
Success came in juniors and youth leagues both in Finland and internationally.
Niskanen won his first adult – silver – medals at the Sochi Olympics at the age of 26, first in the relay and then in the pair sprint.
After this, Niskanen’s medal tally increased with two relay bronzes from the World Championships in Falun and Lahti, but he had to wait for personal medals until the Olympic Games in Beijing.
In Piirainen’s opinion, Niskanen’s trump card over the years has been consistency and a good competitive spirit. The difference between a good and a bad day has been small and in important competitions Niskanen has always been able to stretch.
Like his younger brother Iivo, Niskanen is known as a master of traditional skiing, but in recent years his free technique has also improved and brought results. In Mikkonen’s coaching, Niskanen’s speed side is also in a better model.
– Kerttu and Juho have found a good rhythm in training, so that Kertu’s energy is now constantly good. His hard condition always gets the most out of it, Piirainen praised.
Mikkonen speaks a language that Niskanen understands
Skier Kerttu Niskanen is a joint project of Niskanen and Mikkonen. Parivaljakko often speaks in the we form, and Niskanen’s success is equally the success of both.
Trust in another is very deep, and it shines through to outsiders as well.
In the duo’s opinion, one of the biggest reasons for Niskanen’s success has been that Mikkonen, who ended his own racing career in the second season, has been able to focus only on coaching his wife.
– Last season was the first when I had finished my career. I had 362 days to coach Kerttu, and I used them quite effectively, Mikkonen said and laughed that he spent three days of summer vacation.
– After all, it is the ideal situation that life revolves around me. But we have such a clear division of labor in this dune, one trusts the other and everything works, so we just let it go, Niskanen added.
Piirainen, who once also coached Mikko, has seen the couple’s growth from teenage high school students to adult top athletes and admires their mutual loyalty. They are always there for each other and have each other’s sides in all situations.
Piirainen was also not surprised that Mikkone became Niskanen’s coach. In his opinion, it was actually only a good thing, because Mikkonen has seen Niskanen’s training the most and knows that he is the best coach.
– Juho is in such a position that he can speak directly about all matters, and Kerttu trusts him completely.
Mikkonen hasn’t completely revolutionized Niskanen’s training, but he hasn’t let his wife off the hook. However, the misfortunes of the previous years, Overfit and a fractured fibula, have made Niskanen listen to his body even more closely.
When Mikkonen was still competing, the couple often trained together, only intensity exercises or individual training were done at their own pace.
Mikkonen, who is still in good shape, closely follows Niskanen’s training on the track, and he has an eye above all for honing his technique.
– In my opinion, Juho has been the best coach so far to advise on that technique. It seems that he knows how to tell about it in such an easy language that I can easily understand, Niskanen praised.
Although the couple’s life revolves strongly around skiing and Mikkonen is focused both on serving and helping Niska to an even better level, they also know how to put sports aside.
Niskanen shed light on the characters and chemistry of the double sled team in the Olympic year by stating that both are “pretty flamboyant personalities”.
– I’m even more outgoing and Juho is a bit calmer, but we don’t usually fight in a normal relationship either, so our coaching relationship has gone well.