The women’s and men’s competition of the Pihtiputaa javelin carnival is on Areena and TV2 on Sunday at 12:45 and from 15:00.
Oliver Helander. Lassi Etelätalo. Toni Keränen. Topias Laine. Janne Läspä.
The men’s race of Pihtiputa’s traditional javelin carnival lacks a lot of top domestic throwers. The famous Finnish thrower has thrown 82.42 this season Toni Kuusela. He gets tough opposition from Japan Genki about Dean mixed From Yuta Sakiyama.
Helander recently competed in the Diamond League competition in Lausanne, Etelätalo and Keränen are injured. Laine and Läspä, on the other hand, are focusing on the under-23 European Championships starting in Espoo in less than two weeks.
Of course, Pihtiputaa has lacked top throwers in the past, but now the impact of the absences is reflected more drastically in the participant list. Apart from Kuusela, there is no other Finnish thrower on the list who has broken the 80-meter mark in his career.
Helander and Kuusela are so far the only Finnish throwers who have thrown 80 meters or more this season. A result of 77.83 is enough to place fourth in the statistics.
Two years ago, six Finnish men broke the 80-meter mark. At that time, a result of 77.83 would have been enough instead of 11. We have gone backwards, even though there is still a lot of summer left.
Sports expert Mikaela Ingberg admits that the absences of the injured Etelätalo and Keränen are now prominent. The reserve is thin.
– Yes, Helander’s and Anni-Linnea Alanen the results (59,69 ) have saved the javelin season a lot, says Ingberg.
Ingberg expects that Laine and Läspä, who are fighting for the top spots in the under-23 European Championships, will be able to break the 80-meter mark. That’s probably what’s required with a medal in mind.
– Sure, Topias was operated on last year, but he has thrown more than 80 meters in his career. I expect him to return to being a top ten pitcher. I would expect that both of them would start seeing results after the summer at the latest.
“This is sad”
If the results are not two, there is also no participant list for next Wednesday’s Joensuu GP. Only four throwers have registered for the men’s javelin competition, half of which are Finnish.
Pihtiputaa is eliminated from one of the under-23 European Championship spots. The age group value competitions are a week after the Joensuu competitions.
Three days after the GP races in Joensuu, there is the GP races in Oulu, where there is also a men’s javelin. These have some influence on the situation in Joensuu, but it does not explain everything.
General Secretary of the Joensuu GP Games Tuomo Lehtinen is puzzled by the peculiar situation. He has been in charge of Joensuu for a long time in the organization of the games, and he does not remember a similar incident.
– The honest opinion is that this is sad. I have been involved for 14 years. The list contains exactly those guys who have asked about the place.
– It’s never been like this, and there probably won’t be any need to organize it again even after this. It’s really weak, Lehtinen bangs on about the future of men’s javelin competitions.
Prize money for the 60-meter javelin arc
Lehtinen is aware that the GP races in Joensuu are scheduled during a heavy race rush. In many countries, national championships are held in the same week.
All races of the GP series this season belong to the bronze category of the International Association of Athletics Federations’ Continental series of races. In each race, prize money is available from 25,000 euros.
– But the fact that there are no throwers in the home country for the javelin throwing competition with category A prize money is a really alarming factor.
A competition in the same category will be held on the same day in Karlstad, Sweden. Lehtinen says that currently there are not too many javelin throwers in the world.
– There (Sweden) they also hold a spear. The best guy has thrown 68 meters and five throwers are on the line. Can’t seem to find any throwers.
– I’ve thought that when we have prize money for the five best, when a 60-meter javelin thrower is the first to realize that he’s not kidding when I go to Joensuu to throw the javelin, I’ll get 200 euros.
Joensuu’s competitions have often been held after Pihtiputa’s spear carving elections. There have been withdrawals, but there have still been enough participants.
Lehtinen considers the current state of the Finnish men’s javelin to be worrying.
– It has been said all these years that Finland is a javelin-free country. It doesn’t seem to be anymore.
The matter was corrected on July 2, 2023 at 11:20 a.m.: At the Joensuu GP, only the future of the javelin race is at stake.