Happiest I have ever been for a silver medal

WPC European Championships in Riga, Latvia 9-14.6. 2015

Non sooner than the BodyPower comp was through, I visited Finland and then it was time to fly off to Latvia with Emma, team UK and my fellow Finns!

It was a hard week in more ways than one, but also a very rewarding one. It was great to see that our relationship actually holds under weight cutting, dehydrating, timetables changing and hunger! And I had the privilege to spend the week with great lifters of team UK and the Finns of course. Team management and mutual help was indeed needed, as the Latvian timetables changed and information flow was as it tends to be in big comps like this. To many first timers this help was invaluable, and also to many of the seasoned veterans.

Especially remarkable was the first days timetable change that resulted Finlands star bencher Allan Jokinen rushing to the venue as his class had already started lifting. What happened then was nothing short of phenomenal. Allan, 106kg bodyweight pressing machine, outshone most YouTube videos ever posted. In the time it took to go through 13 lifts on platform, he did 7 warm-up sets and ran to the stage to blast a 230kg unequipped bench press opener, and it was a good lift!  That was a show of strength not to be forgotten easily.

Allan and Niina in the gym, place where the magic (and selfies) happens.

The most memorable moments for me were Emmas lifts though. After witnessing the hardships of traveling, injuries, bodyweight loss, stress and inconsistency, she pushed up a perfect series of lifts, 170, 180 and 190kg. All good lifts, single ply under 75kg class and completely unrivalled overall victory of the female bench. Seeing that she was about to pull out of the competition after her 130kg warm-up backstage, I think that could be seen as a rather good proof of her mental coaching skills to psych herself onstage to a world record after that.

Emmas lifts first on the video:



Other memorable moments from the top of my head:

Tapio Laine at masters 5 age category benching clean 256kg for a world record.

Konstantin Konstantinovs pulling 405 without a belt and having a speech in the upright position, holding the bar.

200kg bench at 67.5kg raw, and 210+ good lift in raw bench at 75kg
450+ squats and 400+ benches from equipped lifters and 360+ squat at 120kg bodyweight, no knee wraps, no suit,

Oleg Bazylevich is always a pleasure to meet, and he did a comeback to competition in Riga, more to come from him in December at a Russian comp!


UK:s Dave Gibson battling it on the bench as his first WPC international. Dave is a disabled lifter who also competes in the open class, one of the nicest chaps you can hope to meet and an absolute inspiration.

Anthony Giddings and Steve Plunkett were true powerlifting nomads and came 3 days after lifting in the GPC Euros to lift in Riga at WPC Championships!

Tony and Steve, an old couple from England

Artur Schrczacz did a remarkable job at single ply 125kg class, smashed all and every one by 400+ squats and a 280 bench, and even with an unfortunate lootrip making him miss his last deadlift, still totaled over a 1000kgs! Polish Powerhouse indeed.

410kg in single ply for Artur

And although the memorable people and lifts are too many to list here, I can´t go without mentioning my trainee Arttu Wahlström who was in his second official comp, and fared well despite flu and sorts. He followed instructions to a letter, cut down from 83 to 75kg weight class, which done the first time could go ten different types of wrong! He had a good go at PR weight of 150 still, but this time it eluded him. He also got bitten by a geared powerlifting bug after seeing Emma bench 190 single ply in the 75kg class, so now he is after the same. We  will have to see what happens in the future, will my trainee outbench my wife or not!

Arttu Wahlström, up and coming Finnish bench presser

On top of that the huge enthusiasm expressed by the lifters all around the world, in my eyes especially Portugal and UK rose high in the team spirit scale! I was witnessing that daily among the UK lifters, and saw it firsthand also on the team Portugals action-packed week filled with camaraderie. It is truly what sports in general are about. Help, being helped, overcoming obstacles and growing as individuals and as a group. Sounds like a cliche, but that is the way I see it nonetheless.

Some of team Portugals guys

Didn´t you lift?

My own competition was shadowed by a tricep tear 10 days prior. Tore it in the last bench session, and the whole arm went funky coloured and also rather postmodern shape took on the arm region.

6 days to competition

I applied tried and true, albeit a bit harsh, Finnish injury healing methods. I trained every day, until 3 days prior to comp I gave it rest. I benched through the pain and was already handling 100kg a day after the injury. I also trained rest of the body heavy, stretched, aggravated and moved the arm around every opportunity I had. On top of that everything that has healing properties from flax seed oil to garlic was consumed, and lots of heat applied.
Also got some magic lotion from Rikard Erlandsson to apply on it come competition, and that herbal concoction of his certainly helped also!

I did assure everybody that the arm was OK, but as anyone could see, it was not. Still warm-ups felt incredibly good. Until I put the benc shirt on...



190 felt like the arm is going to explode. There was some more bleeding, but we proceeded and Emma made sure the feeling did not get any worse, so I warmed up until 230. I played it safer than safe, and as I knew that loose Metal Pro I wore would let me touch 250, so I opened with that and it was easy as it should be, tricep tear or not.

After round 1, Bruno Alves from Portugal was at 240, I 250 and the gold was in with 287.5 only, two others had failed their firs attempts. Next round saw Bruno going for 255, me doing 262.5 and Israeli lifter doing 260, and gold still out for grabs at 287.5.

Bruno Alves, a true fighter

At that point I entertained the idea of putting on a tighter shirt and going for 290-300. Luckily for me, Emma said I was an idiot, and Ano Turtiainen of Metal Sports stayed calm and said that Bruno as a firm and talented lifter might well go past me for the silver, he also did not really believe on the Israeli. So we raised my last attempt to 272.5, enough to defeat Bruno if he got his 270 in, and that would secure the bronze at least, even if the Israeli got his lift.

Ready to lift

Every lift as I was pushing the weight up I felt the tricep, and was afraid a bit. But before the lifts I had managed to gather myself and my thoughts, although lowering and pressing was very careful.
On the round went, and the medal contenders came up. I was in two minds about what to hope. I wished Bruno good luck, but somewhere in the back of my mind I hoped he would fail so I would not have to lift as in that case there was nothing to gain as far as placings are concerned.  For once I truly didn´t want to lift as the tricep was constantly on my mind.

The Portuguese looked confident as he had looked the whole comp, and his team was behind him. He went on the stage fueled by cheers and Portuguese superstrong ammonia. And inch by inch he pushed the 270 for his own competition record and as the lift came to a lockout, he also locked himself to the silver medal.

 All hopes of not lifting washed away, and it was game on. I was feeling triumphant on being able to lift anything, and for some reason I was sure, as was Ano, of Israeli lifters failure, so I could have been content with bronze.

Well, I am glad I haven´t got that much common sense, and I am glad that even injured I have the desire to push further than a bronze. And that desire sparked up something inside me that I haven´t felt in a competition for a while. I had the livestream shooting up at the platform, my wife with me, the man who sold me my first bench shirt coaching and my own trainee watching. And those short seconds it took for the loading crew to prepare the bar, even that was washed away.

It is hard to describe to someone who doesn´t compete in sports, or has not faced expectations (mostly from yourself), fears and wishes, how it exactly feels when after all the buildup it all boils down to the fact you have to perform then and there. There is always the next time, but tomorrow disappears for a moment when you hear the words I heard once again for my last attempt in Latvia.

"THE BAR IS LOADED".

I took a walk around the bench, felt my adrenaline shoot up, and then and there made a decision. I sat down, did my setup and felt my position was good and firm laying on the bench. Anos handout was perfect as it always is, and as he let go off the bar with an ease of a man who has spent the last 20 years handling weights up to 400kg.
The bar was light as a feather.

One goes through a lot during the descent of a bar, it is like a roller coaster. Thousand thoughts and ideas try to invade your mind, but they all get blocked with the singleminded fixation on the lowering bar. I lowered it carefully, but before reaching my chest I felt the control of the bar so perfect I let it come down faster. And soon as I heard the command "PRESS", it was over in an instant.
The bench shirt of mine, Metal Pro, although too big for me, worked like a charm with the faster descent. I also had such a mental buildup that it actually made the last of my lifts the easiest.

Brunos lift second on the video and mine to follow right after that, 270kg and 272.5kg respectively:

I was overjoyed, never thought I could feel that good at lifting only 600 pounds in the 110kg weight class, but this felt better than most of my 300kg+ lifts ever have. And the first competition I have ever in my 10 year competition career had three out of three good lifts. So numbers aside, excuses on injuries aside, and even putting aside the fact that on the last lift I felt good for 20kg more, I was one happy man. And maybe more importantly, unscathed.

Me and Sami Huhtala

So even though thank yous bore any and all readers, great thank you to Emma, Ano and Minna for helping on the day, thanks to Arttu for cheering and filming, big thank you for Bruno Alves for pushing me with the injury to fight and lift head to head with him,  shout out to all the lifters who showed up and walked courageously to the platform and great thanks to Team UK and Team Portugal for showing what team spirit is!

Ano at the Metal stand

Part of team UK

That is my brief overview of the European Championships, sorry for all the people I did not mention by name, met just too many great people to mention all of them! More updates to come to catch up on the really recent events, so stay tuned!