FIS Junior Nordic World Ski Championships wrap up in Lahti
Jan 29, 2019·Nordic Combined
The Mixed Team Event in Ski Jumping followed by Closing Ceremony on Sunday were the last action of the FIS Junior Nordic World Ski Championships in Lahti (FIN). During the eight days. 23 events were held and 15 nations collected medals. The best one was Russia with the 17 medals, seven of them golden. Second in the medal taböe was Norway with four gold medals and total amount of 19 and the third Germany with nine medals. The Marc Hodler Trophy was awarded to Norway, which collected 28 points ahead of Germany (23 points) and Russia (21 points).
Small weather challenges were handled
During the week, heavy snowfall and cold temperatures challenged the organisers in Lahti. FIS Nordic Combined Continental Cup Coordinator Michael Neumayer was satisfied after the week in Lahti.
"I'm happy that we have done everything without any big issues. No wind problems, also the blowers worked pretty well, so the snowfalls were not a problem. In the cross-country part they build up the courses pretty fast after the other competitions. We received a lot of feedback from the athletes, they were happy" says Neumayer.
"It's a big event for the youngsters. It's a first step to get knowledge of how everything works, for example later at World Championships. Most of them are ready to take part for the bigger events."
Lahti is a familiar place for Neumayer who's former ski jumper. "I have know Lahti for many years. You can see the Organising Committee has a lot of knowledge, out in the stadium and at the venues. A big thanks to everybody involved. You need a big staff to handle a full week like this. I'm quite happy that everything worked well in the end", Neumayer concluded.
Many nationalities on the podium and on top ten
Head of the organization, Secretary General Aino-Kaisa Saarinen is really satisfied with the staff and the volunteers of a 1000 persons in total.
"We succeeded in many parts. We had great athmosphere with a loud audience, high-level performances in competitions and no delays in the schedule", says Saarinen. "We have got extremely good feedback from the teams. Lahti Stadium is a compact and works well with these three disciplines. Additionally I'm satisfied that we got events when there were nine nations on the best ten and also not so well-known nationalities on the podium."
A live stream was produced from FIS Junior Nordic World Ski Championships, a high-level multicamera production, which spread to 35 countries. The nations which subscribed the stream most were Finland, Sweden and Norway.
As an additional program during the week,1500 elementary school kids were participating in different kind of ski and snow action in the SnowKidz Tour.
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