Cross-country skiing: no Finns in the top 30
On Saturday, Remi Lindholm, Markus Vuorela and Arsi Ruuskanen will be keen to forget the skiathlon at the World Championships in Trondheim (Norway). The Finns finished beyond 30th place, well behind the winner Johannes Hoesflot Klæbo. ” One of the worst world championships in history”, raged the television channel Yle. According to statistics from the International Ski Federation (FIS),
this is actually Finland’s second worst result. Last time, it was the 33rd place of its highest-ranked representative in the sprint at the 2019 Seefeld World Championships.
The equipment was to blame. In the classic, the cross-country skiers didn’t slide. “It didn’t go as planned. It wasn’t a success from a skiing point of view, but I’m sure everyone worked hard”, Arsi Ruuskane, who finished 35th, toldIltaleti. On the other hand, said Markus Vuorela, “the skating skis were really good”.
“On the first ascent to the classic, we were collectively in a good position, but when we went down to the stadium, we fell quite far behind,” noted coach Teemu Pasanen. What followed did nothing to change the situation. The deficit was not made up.
Reijo Jylhaa, a former cross-country skiing coach who now works as a consultant for the Finnish media, puts things into perspective. Even with good skis, the athletes wouldn’t have made a splash. “We weren’t expecting a medal or a top 6. I still thought that Ruuskanen and Anttola would be capable of skiing up to places 10-15 and, if all went well, even in the top 10,” adds his counterpart Ville Nousiainen, who works for Yle. So we’re a long way from that.
It’s all the more disappointing given that Finland had set their sights on this race, as they were hoping to shine during the relay.
So it was not a good day. Especially as, at the same time, the national federation announced the withdrawal of its star player Iivo Niskanen.
Fortunately, Lauri Vuorinen won bronze in the opening sprint.
