Disgruntled star athletes, rough financial year, embarrassingly ended Ski Weeks adventure, blurry outlook. The Ski Association is certainly not to be envied, writes Pekka Holopainen.
Pekka Holopainen sports reporter
Monday, October 23, Helsinki’s Kalasatama. The Ski Federation organizes a traditional media day for its only flagship of top sports, i.e. the national ski team, in the luxurious premises of its major sponsor.
Referred to national team activity curtailed by economic misery with a glove Iivo Niskanen still missing from the line.
The atmosphere is seemingly harmonious, but those who have followed the sport and athletes for a long time will notice the turmoil beneath the surface.
Kerttu Niskanen did not make his brother’s solution, but used the national team services as much as this one, i.e. not a day. The speech shows great dissatisfaction with the umbrella organization.
Questioning the meaningfulness
A younger colleague Johanna Matintalo questions the meaning of the entire national team activity regarding the ending training season.
Executive director of the association Ismo Hämäläinen reveals that as if the Skiing Federation staring at the bottom wasn’t already tortured enough, the moral posturing of the International Skiing Federation, i.e. the ban on fluoride cream, forces the organization to invest well over 100,000 euros in the control technology in question.
The president of the union Markku Haapasalmi on stage to thank the union’s brand-new sponsor for the 2+2 year contract, which in full can shower the skiers with more than half a million euros of manna.
It goes without saying that the midwife of this deal does not hang around in Kalasatama. He was a commercial manager who left the union with a severance package Jari-Pekka Jouppi.
Are you applying for an extension?
The most interesting question revolving around Haapasalmi is related to the ex-banker’s future intentions when the federal council chooses a new trust management next spring. If Haapasalmi applies for a continuation, according to Urheilu’s information, it will not happen without the challenger or challengers having to fall.
Exactly one week after the mentioned media day, an even more interesting day came for the Ski Federation: the tailboard of the first 17-month exceptional financial period in the organization’s history.
According to an insider contacted by Urheilu in September, the rumored loss of millions would have been reduced by hundreds of thousands of euros.
At the beginning of October The Ski Association announced like a bolt from a clear sky, that the cod would only be about 200,000 euros.
Eye roll trick
After this announcement, several parties from the Ski Federation approached. According to the messages, the “miracle” would be made possible by an accounting trick.
The association would have failed to pay the internal commissions of 350,000 euros for the sponsorship acquisition to its commercial company Nordic Ski Finland in order to make its own numbers look good. Ismo Hämäläinen denied the matter, at least on the magnitude level.
Things will clear up in time, but what is certain is that the fatal misstep called Helsinki Ski Weeks was taken for the second and last time. Millions of investments in cross-country skiing in the middle of Helsinki were not the foundation of the economy, but of clay.
Search time for the shadow team
The training season, which ends in top sportsmanship, was interesting due to the scarcity of resources, or even because of it.
When the B-national team’s activities were self-financed training in Vuokatti, the privately funded Team Electrofit, also named as the “shadow national team” Jarmo Riski as head coach proved to be an attractive option. Lauri Lepistö did not take a place in the B national team, even if he could have. A private team was enough for him. The situation is historic.
Markus Vuorela and Verneri Suhonen took the place of both.
The difference appeared at least to the extent that Simo-Viljami Ojanen the private team has also camped its athletes abroad and, above all, paid for the camp.
If the national team is baking a successful competition season, where the peaks shine, the group behind them develops and there are still tough challengers creeping up behind them, the group should sit down and think about what the hell happened and whether it would be worthwhile for the Ski Federation to always be in financial trouble.
Pekka Holopainen
The author is a columnist based in Pori and the only sports reporter who has been selected as Journalist of the Year in Finland.
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