PLANICA. – Can Robert hear?
The sound of the walkie-talkie is weak for outsiders, but the subject of the question can hear well.
– Hear, Robert Päkk answers.
– I’m now here on the first climb, when the maintenance station is here.
Robert Päkk is the mental coach of the Finnish ski team, but everyone in the team has plenty of other tasks. When to act as a driver, when to race or as a pole guardian – or as an athlete’s psychological support.
Päkki’s task in the men’s 15 km freestyle skiing competition is to act as pole guardian. A situational expert is selected for the position Teemu Lemmettylän after a small negotiation with the intermediate time point, from which the 0.9, 5 and 10.8 kilometer Intermediates are obtained and from which the skiers turn to the downhill section. The race organizers have changed places so many times that the teams have not always kept up.
The deck has two sticks, the so-called sticks of the covenant. Another rod is suitable To Niko Anttola and Perttu Hyvärinen. A stick five centimeters shorter is intended For Remi Lindholm and To Markus Vuorela. The poles have a strap intended for biathlon, so it is easy and quick to change.
Päkk sighs with satisfaction that he hasn’t once had to take real action as a stick guardian.
– There’s Arsi’s curve, Päkk says and points to a place on the lower right where there is now a blue-yellow padded fence.
– Ukrainian colors were put on it. Nice gesture.
In crisis situations, everyone has the opportunity to talk
World Cup debutant Arsi Ruuskanen the races ended quite quickly in the very first start, when he dangerously collided with his advertisement at the beginning of the traditional part of the combined race.
Päkk himself was in another place at the time, on the upper run, but he quickly learned about the seriousness of the situation. However, the race was in progress, so everyone had to focus on their own work, but after the race we acted as in all crisis situations: everyone had the opportunity to talk if there was a need for it.
You can still hear talk from the radio phone while the Finnish team members on the side of the track are being reviewed. There are a total of 12 points. The development of the overall race is monitored and information is transmitted via the radio. You don’t even have to shout at the radio.
“Good Pera, good hit. I’ll get up the rest now! A fight for seconds, you’re doing well!”
“Good Niko! Doing good! Good control, good skiing. 22 seconds from the front.”
Skiing background helps to understand
Päkk, 36, is the Finnish Olympic Committee’s leading expert in psychological coaching and does so-called participatory expert work. He is the personal support of the athletes and the psychological coaching processes go through him.
Päkk was the mental coach of the Finnish Olympic team already at the Tokyo and Beijing Games, he has been preparing for the World Championships with the skiing team since last June.
Päkki, who was born in Tartu, Estonia, is familiar with skiing, as he himself has skied when he was young. His racing career ended at the age of 24 and it included, among other things, the championships of five different countries, the Universiade in Pragelato, Italy, and studies in the United States with the help of a skiing scholarship.
Having his own skiing career is useful for Päkki even today. The competition environment is familiar, and he knows what is required of an athlete. He has also skied through Planica’s tracks so he better understands what the athlete is talking about.
A sub-area that needs to be in order
The competition at the top of the world has become tougher year by year and the nature of the sport has also changed. Skiers no longer ski in the intermediate start race into the forest and come back after half an hour. Now there must be joint departures, finals and entertainment for the people. At the same time, Päkki’s field, i.e. psychological coaching, has also become an everyday thing.
According to physiotherapists, one of the biggest issues in the background forces of sports in the early 2000s was joining the teams. Equally, massage therapists are a natural part of team formations. Just over ten years ago, psychological coaching was just being brought to Finland, Norway was ahead even then.
In recent years, the Finnish team has also focused on nutrition. At the Planica games, the team has its own chef Liisa Eskonen and nutrition coach Kaisa Hall.
According to Päkk, his field is so new that many people don’t even understand what opportunities it offers.
– Physics, technology and psyche. Psyche is one aspect that an athlete must possess. You have to have physical qualities and fitness, you have to have the performance technique and equipment in order, but then you also have to be in good shape mentally, says Päkk.
He stops his sentence for a moment to give encouragement to Markus Vuorela, who is skiing past.
– Dear Make! Flying start! Päkk shouts to Vuorela, who has arrived at the games by speed command, and looks at the results service on his phone.
– The breaks now come with such a bad delay that you can’t shout them. This is mostly encouragement.
Life’s problems go with everyone
The atmosphere in Finland has changed in recent years. Athletes are no longer afraid to talk about topics that were previously taboo. About such topics as depression, menstruation, eating disorders…
– Athletes, however, are people, not machines, even if that’s what they aim for in one way or another. Life’s problems go with everyone, there’s no point in hiding them, says Päkk.
In Päkk’s opinion, the Finnish national skiing team has an open discussion culture, and if necessary, Päkk himself raises issues for discussion or directs attention to the right issues.
At the World Championships in Planica, Perttu Hyvärinen caused a minor commotion when he brought up his own sponsor. The controversy has been splashed above all in the media, and although Hyvärinen himself admitted that it got a little under the skin, according to Päkki, the team has reacted positively to it.
The pressure to succeed comes from outside
The ski team has also been under pressure due to lack of success. After the well-run Beijing Olympics, expectations were high for these Games as well, but so far the medals have had to wait. Päkk emphasizes that these pressures for success have come specifically from the outside.
– The athletes themselves have clear goals, but these external expectations, comments and media interest are distractions in a certain way. You have to be able to process them and accept the cold coolly.
Päkk admits that there are certainly tensions in the team, because everyone wants success. However, in his world, success is also based on how well the athletes have been able to carry out their own, pre-planned process.
– And if others succeed in that better, then you just have to take off your hat to them. If you go down the wrong path in your own process, then you also need to know how to look in the mirror.
– Dear Niko! Doing good! Good controlled skiing! Päkk shouts and a moment later similar shouts can be heard from the coach down the hill From Ville Oksase.
Päkk listed one rule of the game
The youth world champion Niko Anttola was expected to have strong skiing before the race and the youngster is answering the call.
Anttola, who turned 20 years ago a couple of weeks ago, is one of the youngest Finnish skiers in history in the prestigious adult competitions. In addition to him, there is a 21-year-old in the team Niilo Moilanen22 years old Jasmin Kähärä and 23-year-old Arsi Ruuskanen.
According to Päkk, the young newcomers have been well received in the team and the conkari skiers have been good examples for the younger ones.
– For example Anne (Kyllönen), Kerttu (Neck) and Krista (Pärmäkoski) know how to focus on their own thing, but they have a good eye for the game if they see someone younger in need of support.
The team has built common game rules, but Päkk has reserved one rule for this list:
– That rule is that you have to have fun. Let’s do things in a way that makes this fun. Otherwise, there’s no point.
Just a little excitement
Many encouragements in different languages, Czech, Polish, English and Swedish, can be heard next to Päkk. Sometimes Päkk gives encouragement to Estonian skiers as well. However, the tracking remains strictly on the skiers of the Finnish team.
– Dear Pera, you hit well! The rest of you get up now! Doing good! Second battle, you’re doing well! Päkk shouts to Hyvärinen when he passes by the place for the last time.
It also means that Päkki’s work at the track will end from this day. He walks a short distance towards the stadium and stops for a moment to talk with Lemmettylä about the progress of the race.
Hyvärinen ranks 13th as the best Finn, but Anttola gets the biggest joy in his World Cup debut. He is 24. Lindholm and Vuorela fall from the top more than expected, as Lindholm ranks 32nd and Vuorela 43rd.
– The system got a little messed up when the boy from Kazakhstan (Fedor Karpov) obviously went the wrong way, Päkk says to Lemmettylä.
– Yes, it’s a sad story when four or five Norwegians are in the lead, Lemmettylä says and looks at the results service.
The most exciting moment in the competition is actually whether you can make it Johannes Hösflot Kläbo for awards or not. Eventually Harald Östberg Amundsen wedges into second and drops Kläbö to fourth.
“Here I am”
Not all Finnish skiers have reached the finish line yet, when Robert Päkk and Teemu Lemmettylä head towards the service truck. Päkk is there when the athletes arrive, and listens if the athlete needs to vent his feelings.
After that, the preparation for the dawn of the next day begins. There is monitoring of exercises, meetings, eating and running everyday life.
While some of the skiers have found a chess board in their hotel in Tarvisio on the Italian side and have been tuning their brains on it, Päkki hasn’t found time for this yet. Instead, he always finds time for athletes and other team members.
– I kind of exist, as I usually say to athletes. Here I am. You can always tug me by the sleeve, says Päkk.