The race is on Photo

Photographer’s Note

History of Skiing in Finland
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It is generally believed that the first official Finnish ski competition was held in 1879 at Tyrnהvה. The tradition of Oulu Ski Race began in 1889 and lasted for over 20 years, this race being the most important ski event in Finland back then. There was the epoque when flat skiing competitions were very popular, these competitions used to take place on frozen lakes or on fields.

In the 1920's the Finns adopted from the Norwegians their traditional style for skiing, cross-country. Puijo in Kuopio and Salpausselkה in Lahti developed to be the new centrepoints for winter sports in Finland. The Salpausselkה SkiGames have been organized in Lahti since 1923. "Theassociation to Promote Skiing in Finland" was established as early as in 1908, being the predecessor of the present Finnish Ski Association.

Veli Saarinen was the first Finnish athlete to win an Olympic gold medal in skiing, this historic event took place at the Lake Placid Winter Olympics in 1932. During the war sports competitions had to be pushed a side, but assoon as in the 1950's Finnish skiers had made their comeback among the top-skiers of the world. Introducing of the newskating technique for skiing in the 1980's and it's vast popularity caused one of the biggest changes in the skiinghistory.

Sweden and Finland adopted ski jumping from the Norwegians inthe 1880's. The first Finnish ski jumping Olympic gold was won by Antti Hyvהrinen at the Cortina d'Ampezzo Winter Olympics in 1956. Nordic combined discipline (skiing & ski jumping) is also originally a norwegian sport and it became known in Finland at the same time as ski jumping.

This shot was captured at the 81st Lahti Ski Games.These guys were fighting it out in the Nordic Combined race.

john_c, peter1892, plimrn, dragonslayero, rahul__rahul__ has marked this note useful

Critiques | Translate

fabio_ts (13674) 2006-05-02 3:02

Fantastic action picture David, excellent POV and really well done, all my compliments!!

have a nice week,
Fabio.

john_c (24635) 2006-05-02 10:39

Hi David,
A crisp clear shot of these skiiers taken from an ideal low angle POV. I like the dynamics of the shot and how the red hue breaks up the largely B&W format. Very fine work.
John

yigalco (372) 2006-05-03 8:21

David Hi,
Good action(base) photo,
Like the way you capture the race in the beginning
The light in the left side are little bit disturb, but good catch any way

Regards,
Yigal

[2]

peter1892 (3201) 2006-05-11 11:57

Good action shot, and your POV is perfect for this. The photo gives the impression of the moving a quite a speed.

plimrn (19596) 2006-05-11 14:49

Hi David,
You've captured the excitement of the race well in your well-framed compo looking up at the snow flying from the flying skis. I really like good action shots; I think there are so few here is because they really are difficult to capture.
Regards, Pat

dragonslayero (3106) 2006-05-26 12:58

Hello David.
I like the action and at the same time exhaustion in the faces of the skiiers.
Composition is good, you avoided the all flags that might disturb the power of this moment and at the same time made sure that the skiiers are in sharp focus.
The condition for this shot seems to have been perfect, the lighting is not to sharp and you have achieved very good detail even to the snow.
Thanks you for sharing.

Odd Jarle

pastadog (12821) 2006-05-28 2:03

Hi David - attractive action/motion shot, with the 3 skiers in different positions and with different expressions, I like that. I like the low POV. Regards, Daniel

rahul__rahul__ (2250) 2006-07-27 10:08

Hi David
nice picture, I like the moment you have caught this at, colors/contrast is good, and you have a good POV too. Nice note.
Great job
tfs
Rahul

gunbud (27755) 2006-12-02 16:22