First silver and bronze medals from Torino as fancied Finns stumble
Ski-jumper Matti Hautamäki and snowboarder Markku Koski fly the flag
The opening weekend of the 20th Winter Olympics in Torino produced two Finnish medals, although the medallists were not perhaps the most fancied of the Finns taking part.
In the normal hill ski-jumping individual event held in Pragelato on Sunday evening, all eyes were on Janne Ahonen, who has dominated the sport in recent years, and on Jakub Janda of the Czech Republic, the current World Cup leader.
However, Janda finished a mediocre 13th and Ahonen - who suffered somewhat from wind conditions on his second jump that left Finnish head coach Tommi Nikunen fuming - could eventually do no better than 6th, despite being in joint 2nd spot after his first effort.
Any disappointment over Ahonen's absence from the podium and his continued failure to grab an individual Olympic medal was nevertheless made up for by a fine showing from the in-form Matti Hautamäki , who improved on his Salt Lake City bronze on the big hill and took silver, just one point behind the Norwegian winner Lars Bystöl. Hautamäki, 24, was chased home by another Norwegian, Roar Ljökelsöy , another one point behind him. Only eight points separated 1st and 10th places in a tight competition.
Hautamäki, who pulled himself up from 6th place with a second jump of 103.5 metres, was delighted and shocked at his medal, and insisted that his performance would not put any additional pressure on him for the big hill (140 metres) next Saturday. This is despite the fact that he won the event here at the Pre-Olympics last year.
Much the same pattern was repeated in the man's halfpipe event on Sunday afternoon, at least as far as the Finns were concerned.
Markku Koski took bronze behind the American duo of Shaun White and Daniel Kass. White was definitely the class act on the day, producing a first run in the final that put him into a comfortable lead. Kass's second run took him past Koski for the silver medal.
The 24-year-old Koski was not among the Finnish favourites for the event, having secured his passage to Torino only after injury to another local hopeful. However, he more than justified his selection, repeating his "ambush" of the other Finns from Salt Lake City (where he was best-placed and eighth), leaving behind him Antti Autti (5th) and Risto Mattila (10th). The fourth Finnish entrant, Janne Korpi, did not make the 12-man final.
As if to further underline the "unexpected" nature of the weekend's events, Saturday's opening day had seen the failure of one of the games' hottest ante-post favourites, Hannu Manninen in the Nordic Combined. Manninen went into the competition having already wrapped up a second successive World Cup title, and with a reputation for recovering from poor jumps and skiing past his rivals as if they were standing still. Some of his World Cup performances over the past two years have been little short of murderous.
Unfortunately Manninen also has an less enviable reputation for never having won an individual medal at World Championship or Olympic level, and on Saturday he could finish only in 9th place. Perversely, it was not the ski-jumping that let him down this time, but his skiing: he started the 15km race in a handy 8th spot, and only a relatively modest distance behind the leaders.
As it happened, the best Finn in the field was Jaakko Tallus, who came in a creditable 5th behind the surprise winner, Germany's Georg Hettich.
Manninen will have to gather his thoughts and focus on the sprint event, while Janne Ahonen must get over his annoyance at being denied a clear shot at a medal by the weather and concentrate on the big hill.
Links:
Torino 2006 (Official Site)
Helsingin Sanomat
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| 13.2.2006 - TODAY |
First silver and bronze medals from Torino as fancied Finns stumble
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