Skiing

I started out my athletic career as a cross-country skier. I did a lot of skiing as young. First it was only recreational but then I got more serious. I did my first races at my grand mother's work. The company that she worked for had a theme day for its employees and their families. The day included ski racing for the kids. I loved it!

Later I started racing more and more. My dad would take me to races and training as often as I liked to. I first raced for IK Örnen and then for Esbo IF. As I progressed I decided to change club and I went to Kirkkonummen Hihtoseura. This was a great move for me and I got my first personal coach. His name was Seppo Kolehmainen and he was a former national ski team member. As I worked with Seppo I became better and better. I hadn't done that great before. But my dad and everyone always kept telling me I had potential. Eventually at an age of about 15 I started reaching the regional top. This ment that I qualified to take part in the National Championships for juniors. Not everyone were entitled to participate. It was a great honor and I was so excited to be able to race against the very elite juniors in the country. I didn't do so well my first years but when I started competing in the age group of under 18 years I started reaching success. I won the regional championship in Helsinki on 10 km freestyle. And it turned out that the longer the distances got the better my chances were. My best result remains to be 40th at the Finnish Championship on 30km freestyle in the age group of under 20 years old. This was quite a performance because there were about 120 racers that had qualified to compete.

Biking

I started riding bikes in 1991 but I did not try my first race until the next year, in 1992. I did very well because I seemed to have an excellent fitness due to my cross-country skiing background. I also seemed to have a good riding technique. I could ride trails some wouldn't dare to try, and I was constantly seeking for more challenging trails.

I pretty much dominated the under 18 year old category in Finland and it wasn't rare that I reached podium in the senior category.

This was to be my first and last year in the junior category. I did great and took a silver medal in the Finnish Championships in the under 18 category. I took bronze medal in the Scandinavian Championships in the downhill event. And in the same Championships I took 6th in the cross-country event. I was ready for the seniors!

When I reached the senior category I was ready to go and get some good results in. I had trained well, and unfortunately I fractured my collarbone during a training ride. Because of this I had to take time off my training and I wasn't able participate in the first spring races. When the doctor gave me permission to race I had lost some fitness and I didn't breakthrough with storm in the senior category.

I decided to take part in a downhill World Cup that took place in Lillehammer, Norway. Maybe my fitness would be good enough to get some good results in downhill? Practice went fine but during the race I crashed and fractured my tibia. I have always wondered what my time would have been like if I would have reached the finish line. During practice I had had a maximum speed of 49 km/h. This was during dry conditions. In the race it was wet conditions and afterwards lying in the hospital I checked my speedometer and it had recorded a maximum speed of 54 km/h!

It was a bad experience to be injured so much during the 1993 season, that I decided to focus only on X-C instead. At least in X-C you didn't have to live on the edge to do well.
Next season I started doing well again. I got the opportunity to try to race internationally, and I did very well considering I traveled and did everything by myself. I was only 19 at that time!