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Janne Hänninen presents a radical model for saving Finnish elite sports.
The model excludes the Olympic Committee and focuses on the day-to-day activities of the athlete-coach pair.
Top sports will be concentrated in two Olympic training centers: Urhea and Vuokatti-Ruka.
Hänninen emphasizes cooperation, concrete support and continuous learning in elite sports.
World to the sharpest peak in speed skating at the turn of the millennium Janne Hänninen is a vision to save Finnish elite sports.
Hänninen’s proposal is radical: it cuts the Olympic Committee out of the core of elite sports and brings the elite sports unit into the daily routine of athletes.
“After Paris, there has been a lot of discussion here about the state of Finnish elite sports. Quite a few have complained that there is no strategy or system, so I thought, hell, it’s not that hard. Let’s do something,” says Hänninen.
The starting point of his model is the daily work of the athlete-coach pair. At the core are the absolute peaks of different sport groups, national team activities and support activities.
The core is surrounded by a firewall, which the Olympic Committee is not allowed to enter by the director of sports of the Finnish Skating Association Hänninen.
“I don’t know how it will be received, but in recent years the Olympic Committee has focused on things other than elite sports,” he says.
“After all, they have three mainstays, i.e. more movement, club activities and elite sports. Couldn’t that top sport be done through this model?”
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“In recent years, the Olympic Committee has focused on things other than elite sports.”
Janne Hänninen (right) was the head coach of the Finnish national speed skating team at the Vancouver Olympics 2010. He went through the men’s 500 meter race with Mika Poutala (left).
Top sport will be concentrated in two Olympic training centers in the model.
“Summer and ice sports to Brave Helsinki. Snow sports need their own center, which would be Vuokatti-Ruka. The distribution of public money to elite sports could also go through them.”
However, the distribution of money going according to the proposal is not a big deal for Hännen.
“I know that the team will certainly intervene in that, but the most important thing is what happens inside the firewall. Putting it in the center and supporting it, sparring and continuous learning as well as looking for competitive advantages with the community. That’s the main thing,” he says.
“The fire wall means that the core of top sports will not come to the core of top sports to be jogged and wised up, but the top sports team will take care of making top sports themselves.”
At the same time, Hänninen throws the ball in the direction of this group. The new model emphasizes cooperation, which should be concrete and not just festive words on paper.
“Already in the humu era, there was talk about the importance of cooperation between species, but it was never done. In my opinion, it was quite correct at the level of speech, but it has not been put into practice.”
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“Others don’t come to the core of that top sport to jog and wise up.”
Janne Hänninen rose to the sharpest international peak in speed skating at the turn of the millennium. Picture from the 2001 World Championship.
Hänninen says that the new model requires a change of attitude. The focus must shift to improving, supporting and sparring the athlete-coach pair.
“The work is done for the athlete, not for one’s own position, for the CEO of the company upstairs or for the board of the Olympic Committee,” he underlines.
Urhea, the Olympic Committee and sports associations exist precisely because they would help athlete-coach couples, Hänninen reminds. He wants the same from a top sports unit.
“The top sports unit must be in Urhea and in the Vuokatti-Ruka center, and not in any office building somewhere else,” says Hänninen.
“They should be meeting coaches and athletes every day: supporting, encouraging and even joking a little in between and so away that there will be a similar increase in the level of positive learning and doing for everyone.”
Hänninen currently coaches skaters and feels that coaches are alone. Support from the elite sports unit has been “really small”.
“Yes, you can see their employees now and then, but you should see a lot more.”
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“You should be meeting coaches and athletes every day: supporting, cheering and even joking around a bit.”
Olympic committee chairman Jan Vapaavuori (left), top sports director Matti Heikkinen and team manager of the Paris competition team Leena Paavolainen held their closing briefing in Paris on the closing day of the games on August 11.
In its model Hänninen does not take a position on whether the core includes individual athlete-coach pairs or whether the coaching is handled by the national team.
“The sports are of such different types that there is no single correct answer to that, and no one can direct it from above,” he reasons.
Hänninen reminds us of the elite stage of his model, i.e., in practice, Olympic or Paralympic level athletes whose focus is strictly on top sports.
“Strategies are very often sought from the upper level, and then they go to the core at some point. I’ve thought about what athlete-coach pairs need and started to build from the center outward,” he says.
Sparring, sharing best practices, continuous development, searching for a competitive advantage and nurturing international standards sound like a valid recipe for success, but beautiful things are easier to record than to implement.
However, Hänninen believes in the functionality of the coaches’ collective.
“When smart people talk to each other, there are many things that can be done even better.”
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