Holmen wins European Marathon title (© Getty Images)
Janne Holmen’s Marathon victory at the European Championships in Munich, revived memories of what many had come to assume was an extinct line of distance running champions, “the Flying Finns”.
Similar predictions of the Finnish demise were also prevalent in the 1960’s and shown to be equally premature with the Finnish track renaissance of the following decade.
Significantly, the 1970’s revival of Finnish distance running was lacking in one respect, the Marathon.
There was a Boston win for Olavi Suomalainen in 1972, and Lasse Viren took a remarkable fifth place in Montreal after completing his second 5000m and 10,000m Olympic double. More recently, there had also been some success on the women’s side with victories at major city Marathons for Paivi Tikkanen (Berlin, 1989) and for Ritva Lemettinen (Chicago 1993 and 1995).
Yet two years into the new century the last major championship Marathon victory for Finland stood as the 1954 European Championship title in Bern by Veikko Karvonen, who was also a Boston winner and took Olympic bronze in 1956 during a distinguished career.
Janne Holmen, a 25-year-old post graduate history student, was born in Jomala in the Aland Islands which are situated between Finland and Sweden at the Southern end of the Gulf of Bothnia. The islands are Finnish but contain a predominantly Swedish speaking population.
Holmen is an intelligent, level headed man who anticipates the usual question about national loyalties which is addressed to all Aland islanders
“I don’t know if you can measure nationality in percentages, I have many loyalties to other countries, without that making me less Finnish. It is a matter of cultural competence, the more countries you learn to know, the better.”
Holmen’s ‘world-view’ encompasses his family life. Like most top athletes he travels around the world to train, prior to Munich visiting the Ifrane Mountains in Morocco, Font Romeu in France, and a new training venue at Dalmanutha Farm in Belfast, South Africa.
It was on one of his earlier training trips to Morocco that Holmen met his wife Laila, who is the sister of the 1992 Olympic 10,000m champion Khalid Skah. Holmen converted to the Muslim religion in 1999, and the couple married in Fez in February 2000.
Holmen might be a ‘child of the world’ but there is no doubting where his athletics loyalties stand, and not surprisingly, as he is a student of history, he is a aware of the significance his marathon victory will have on the fortunes of Finnish running.
“I think it’s great that I could continue the series of Finnish medals in the long distance discipline. I hope my victory makes it clear that Finnish runners still have the same possibilities as anyone else to be successful in running.”
It is a vast understatement just to say that Holmen comes from an athletics background. In Finland, his family are to running what the Kinnunen’s (Jorma - World record, javelin 1969 - and his son Kimmo - 1991 World Champion, javelin -) are to throwing. Holmen’s father Rune, was a 13:43 5000m runner who competed at the 1971 European championships, while his mother Nina, was 1974 European 3000m champion.
“Athough they had finished their careers before I was born, my father and mother were still "joggers" when I was a child, so it happened easily that I also started to run.”
After first being attracted by chess and then playing a season at football, “at 12 years of age I started with running - I was keeping a diary from the start, but I did less then 100km the first year.”
Rune has been his coach ever since, although his mother did offer some early advice regarding muscle stretching for warming up.
Holmen really still can’t believe the way the European championship race, which he won in 2:12:14 after a very slow start (16:35 first 5km), developed in his favour. Running only the second Marathon of his career (debut - 2:16:24, Rotterdam 2001), he stole the race, which was held in torrential rain. At half way (66.44), his only company was the Norwegian Karl Ramussen with the vastly more experienced squads of Spaniards and Italians letting them establish a 57 second lead by that point. By the time Ramussen started to drop back after 30km, that margin had increased to nearly a minute and a half.
“I got my lead without any real effort. I think that some of the runners were blinded by the "old wisdom" that the early leader never lasts.”
Despite an illustrious distance running pedigree Finland has never produced a sub 2:10 runner but Holmen knows that if he is to aim for higher prizes then, “I can’t make 2:10 the ultimate goal of my career, I must aim somewhat higher.”
Holmen has good track credentials (PB -13:35.62, 5000m and 28:23.84, 10,000m) having taken a silver medal (10,000m) and a fourth place (5000m) at the 1999 European U23 Championships. As such, next summer he has already decided to concentrate on the track and will not contest another marathon until the autumn of 2003.
“I think one more track season will benefit me as a marathon runner in the future. I know that I have my greatest potential in the marathon.”
IAAF
