Athletics World Championships 19.8.–27.8. Ylen channels. See the schedule and broadcast information of the games at this link.
BUDAPEST. – Phew. This is where it gets really exciting, walking legend Valentin Kononen says and shakes his hands.
Kononen, 54, is standing on the main street of Budapest, on the boulevard called Andrássy út, which runs towards Pest. The boulevard in question is 2.5 kilometers long and is one of the UNESCO World Heritage Sites. Right now, however, the focus is only on a section of about 500 meters.
51 walkers saw the track set up on the boulevard back and forth, turning in the central place of Hungarian independence, Heroes’ Square. Kononen’s personal coaching Aku Bearden is one of the athletes who conquer the kilometer-long track.
Kononen, who is located about a hundred meters from the soldering point, watches his wristwatch and mobile phone closely every three minutes and repeats the same pattern over and over again.
When the athletes pass Kononen further from the other side of the track, Kononen shouts to Partanen for a kilometer break. About a minute later, the coach gives feedback on the technique with a few words while the athletes cool off in front of Kononen’s nose.
– Shoulders down. At ease. Remember the sternum! Kononen yells at Partase before mentioning that he is excited.
It can also be seen in the resting heart rate, which Kononen says is normally 45.
– It’s showing 77 now, Kononen states and shows the number on the heart rate monitor of his wristwatch.
There are several reasons for tension. Partanen is covering a distance of 20 kilometers for the first time in the prestigious competition, of which he is now 11 kilometers behind. So far, Partanen has progressed at an average pace of 3 minutes and 54 seconds per kilometer.
So each kilometer has gone four seconds faster than three weeks ago in Lahti, where Partanen walked to a new Finnish record of 1.19.25.
Kononen repeats the same things to his protege at the end of every kilometer. It’s also a matter for the journalists standing next to it almost every time when Partanen, who is traveling in the main group, has passed Kononen.
– The guys are going really fast, Kononen updates.
Kononen and Partanen are now in many ways in the unknown land of elite sports. They shouldn’t even be there according to the original plan.
A huge change
The Tokyo Olympics in August 2021 was a whirlwind inside Kononen.
Partanen, who has been training under Kononen’s coaching since 2012, had made the best race performance of his career and finished ninth in his parade distance of 50 kilometers.
Kononen, who achieved three prestigious race medals at the age of fifty, with the 1995 world championship as the crown, is also known for his royal journey.
Just when Kononen and Partanen’s collaboration had begun to bear fruit, a 50-kilometer funeral was held in the streets of Sapporo. The International Olympic Committee had announced that the fifty would no longer be part of the Olympic program in the future.
It also caused the International Association of Athletics Federations to remove the sport from its list. In the future, the journey to royalty would be only 35 kilometers.
At 50 kilometers, a top-level walker pushes the whole distance at a kilometer pace, which is just under four and a half minutes on average. At 35 kilometers, the kilometer pace must be less than 4.15. In order for the walker to manage 20 kilometers, another 20 seconds must be dropped from the average speed of 35 kilometers, preferably under 3.55.
– 3.54! Not yet, not yet! Kononen shouts to Partane at 12 kilometers and specifies afterwards that the plan is to strike at 16–17 kilometers.
– Remember the sternum, the sternum! Kononen repeats again.
On the breastbone, Kononen tells Partase that the step must be built through the middle body. When the thoracic spine is optimally rotated, a lever arm effect is created in the middle body: when the right shoulder turns forward and the left hip extends forward at the same time, Partanen’s middle body is like a spring that takes a step forward.
Kononen, with his chest-hugging screams, only tries to remind Bartas, who is tiring round after round, about something that is vital for success.
The words don’t fall on deaf ears: Partanen beats every kilometer to 3.56 from 14 to 17 kilometers.
Partanen’s shares are on the rise, as the initial momentum that heralded the final time below 1.18 is starting to do its job for many. It can be seen as breaks in front of Partanen.
Partanen, who was 11th at 11 kilometers, already ranks sixth at 18 kilometers.
– 15 seconds to a medal! The sternum! Now run, run! Kononen gets excited, even though Partanen’s kilometer time drops to exactly four minutes for the first time.
However, the situation is under control, because Partase has not yet received a single warning about a technical fault. They were Partase’s crowning glory at last year’s World Championships. In them, he was flagged to the side at 35 kilometers because the warning account was full already at 11 kilometers.
The reason for the rejection was that Partanen stepped too high. Lowering it under Konone’s watchful eye has been the main priority when building the 2023 season. According to Konone, every step has been honed by videotaping all the hard training since last October. There have been 3–4 exercises per week.
– Ten hours, Kononen estimated as the amount of analysis material that ended up on the hard drive.
Now Partanen and Kononen are reaping the fruits of that work in Budapest. In the last kilometer, Kononen is no longer near the watering place, but jogs towards the finish area to see his protégé cross the finish line. To get there, the coach no longer relies on the walker’s textbook steps.
– It’s going to be a really sick time. The theoretical maximum, says Kononen as he jogs.
Partanen arrives at the finish line in sixth place in 1.18.22. It beats the Finnish record of three weeks ago by one minute and three seconds. The sixth place is the best result of a Finnish walker at the Olympic and World Cup level since 1995 and Kononen’s 50 km World Cup gold.
The last kilometer of Partanen especially warms up Kono. Despite being tired, Partanen managed it in 3:56.
– It tells about optimal speed distribution. This would not have been the case if the last kilometer had been between 4:10 and 4:15, says Kononen.
A brave decision on the return flight from the Olympics
After the race, Kononen explains in more detail how Partanen’s SE pace was built. The foundation stone was cast in the aftermath of the 50-kilometer Funeral on the way back from the Olympic trip to Sapporo.
– After the Olympics, the assumption was that Aku’s main distance would be 35 kilometers. However, in Sapporo, I started thinking that twenty would suit Aku better. I suggested it to Aku at the airport before boarding the plane, Kononen says.
The decision was made before the plane landed at Helsinki-Vantaa.
– Aku thought about it for a couple of hours on the plane and then came in the middle of the flight to say that the plan works. It was quite a brave decision, since I didn’t have any experience in coaching for 20 kilometers either, says Kononen.
The task was not made easier by the fact that Partanen was already turning 30 at the time of decision-making. Although two years later in Budapest, Partanen is in the best shape of his career and was only 30 seconds short of the World Championship medal at 20 kilometers, getting his body used to a completely different pace after years has been the sum of several trials and errors.
– This has been a two-year process. Last year was completely spent learning what an athlete can endure, what kind of speed he can endure and how he recovers from a 20-kilometer training session – and Aku didn’t recover enough.
According to Kononen, Budapest’s SE performance is based on a very exceptional period in Partanen’s career.
– In June, I showed Aku the training plan that I built last October. It included competitions and weekly head practices. For the first time, we had been able to implement the plan completely without injuries, flu or any other disturbances. It’s really rare.
Kononen says that he expected Parta to be in the top fight, taking into account the factors mentioned above. Instead, the change from the World Cup a year ago has been a surprise for the coach.
– It has surprised me how far we have come in a year. This has been a great learning process for us, says Kononen.
How are the European Championships going?
Partanen’s name has been on display since the Kaleva Games, because the SE era at that time was a hard currency for Europeans.
After the 20 km World Cup, the expectations of the Finnish athletics crowd are not in a downward direction at least. Only three Europeans, including Germany, beat Lappeenranta’s Urheilu-Mieste walker Christopher Linke arrived at the finish line only ten seconds before Parta.
Without health concerns, Partanen is one of the biggest medal hopes of the Finnish team at next year’s European Championships in Rome in the papers of many who follow athletics. But.
Kononen hints that Partase may miss the EC trip completely.
– It is a secondary competition for us. We have talked about the Olympics. We haven’t even decided whether Aku will participate in the European Championships, says Kononen.
– We haven’t discussed the whole thing. It’s not our focus in any way. If it fits the training program, let’s go. Otherwise, no. First, these races will be taken care of. The work is only halfway through, says Kononen and refers to the 35 kilometer race that awaits next Thursday.
In that, Kononen does not believe that the excitement will raise the heart rate as high as on Saturday, because the condition of the protector in relation to the others is now known. The excitement of a coach differs from the excitement of a Basic Spectator in many ways. Especially at the numerical level.
– It didn’t break a hundred. It rose to 92 in the final run, Kononen reveals Saturday’s maximum heart rate after examining the data provided by the wristwatch.