http://www.iaaf.org/WCH05/news/Kind=2/newsId=31325.html
Brave Finnish crowds exhibit the highest degrees of SISU in extreme weather
Wednesday 10 August 2005
Helsinki, Finland – One of the information booklets available by the door of Media Centre at the 10th IAAF World Championships in Athletics, is entitled << “Portraying Finland” – Facts and Insights >> and in the present extremely inclement weather conditions in Helsinki, it has a conspicuously appropriate front cover photograph of a deep blue Finnish lake.
Helsinki might not be anywhere near Finland’s Lake District which lies to the north and west of the capital but presently you would never have guessed. The city seems ready to float away into the Baltic, like one of the huge ferries which ply the waters daily between here and Tallinn or Stockholm.
Incidentally, the storms are causing such high waves – between 4 to 7 metres in height – that the ferry schedules are currently postponed or cancelled altogether.
These are EXTREME weather conditions we are facing.
Host to four previous major athletics championships
On walking from my hotel this morning, momentarily in dry conditions, I decided to ask a few of the town’s inhabitants about the rain, and while each was very apologetically about the weather I got the impression that I was perhaps just a weak foreigner.
As unusual that these conditions might be in Helsinki for the beginning of August, after all they have held an Olympic Games, two European Championships, and the inaugural World Championships here, and at the very worst each time managed to balance warm, sunny weather with the occasional shower, it is true that the character of the Finnish has been shaped by their extreme climate.
Climate extremes
The Finns celebrate short glorious summers (honest, they do) with figures of over +30C, and then dive into the extreme’s of -50C degree temperatures in the winter. They are country people at heart who have learnt to live with the semi-arctic and adapt to it.
In the extremes of this climate has been forged the spirit that is Finnish ‘SISU’, a directly untranslatable word which defines the national resolve, stubbornness, guts, determination, and in a sporting context, the absolute will to win without compromise that was seen in Paavo Nurmi or Lasse Viren for example.
At the end of the nineteenth century, “when life was a constant matter of preparing for the worst” for most of the Finnish population, “the largely agrarian society favoured dogged labourers”, those people with a discipline and a capacity for hard work, people who showed resilience and fortitude.
Impressive audience figures
Today, the World Championships have reached the fifth of nine days of competition and are already in huge debt to this Finnish resolve as the audience, who have paid in some instances 305 euros for a seat for just one session, are unflinchingly positive, even upbeat in their support of the athletes. Even in the pouring rain they are filling the stands of the Olympic stadium with audiences each morning and evening session of over 25,000.
Yesterday in a brief spell of sunshine the sold-out the stadium in the morning, and tonight every ticket is again sold for the men’s Javelin Final.
Anywhere else in the world and in heavy rain and cold weather the benches would be empty but in Finland the fans, as the population as a whole, have learnt to live with nature and all its extremes. They have one answer. They put on an extra thick jumper, cover themselves in a plastic apron, and get on with enjoying the sport.
Time for some sun bathing?!
This morning Tim Hutchings, the former British distance runner, commentating for ‘Eurosport’ TV, spent much of the session remarking about the one spectator in the crowd who was sitting with a bare chest. Possibly, this was even an extreme for a Finn in temperatures of about +15, but in his own way singular way it painted a picture of overall Finnish defiance.
If anyone ever questioned the Finnish love of athletics, then these dank, wet miserable conditions have proved all the doubters wrong. Our sport might not be able to bask in warm weather at the moment but it can rejoice that in Finnish SISU it has found the loyalist of friends.
Chris Turner for the IAAF