Finnish track&field nationals were held at Vaasa during the last - TopicsExpress

Finnish track&field nationals were held at Vaasa during the last weekend. 11 athletics were selected to the world champs in Moscow 10.-18.8. At the distance running, one of the issues nowadays is whether the Kenyan runners should compete at the Finnish nationals or not. As it is at this moment, it is quite hard for a Finnish runner to became a Finnish champion at least in a 5000 and 10 000 meters, x-country running and halfmarathon. The situation is difficult, and one can´t find a good answer to satisfy everyone. There are several issues to think about like would it be possible for Kenyans to run in a national as without the rights to become champions without citizenship, why some of the Finnish t&f-teams value the winning of Kalevan malja so high (as to became the best team of that year, and for this the winning athletics are bringing to a team points from a several Finnish champs, why some people are talking about the depression of the Finnish distancerunners without doing anything, how Finnish runners can motivate themselves to practice and to compete with this situation. The system is the matter, that needs to face a proper discussion. My best years as a runner were from 1978 to 1987 (1.50; 3.41; 7.56; 13.44; 28.21; 2.16,11), and as I remember, even then there were prophets to say, that the Finnish distancerunning is dead. As if anything can be said without proper thinking, and with a loud voice. I´m not saying that, but I think that the runners themselves should do something to clear this situation. The public audience, journalists, teamleaders etc. can only make comments about what they see, but they are not the ones, who should show the solution, although they might be a part of it. Also, is right now a good one to start to co-operate among the runners some other way, than with the attitude "I´m doing this just by myself, you others do just what you wish". kalevankisat2013.fi