PREVIEW - Men's Javelin Throw

There is one big favourite to win the title of World Champion in men’s Javelin. Tero Pitkämäki of Finland is the only thrower who has thrown twice over the 90m mark this year.

Last year Pitkämäki finished eighth in the Olympic final. He was the best Finn competing in athletics at the Olympics and is a very popular athlete back home, but few people expected him to rise to rise to be number one favourite in the World Championships. At the start of this season, Pitkämäki’s PB was still only 84.64m.

Now it is almost seven metres longer. In late June, Pitkämäki threw 91.53m in Kuortane, Finland, aided by a strong tailwind. This was the sixth longest throw in the world since the latest changes in the implement specification.

In late July, in Oslo at the last TDK Golden League meet before the World Championships, the 22-year-old threw 90.54m in the fourth round.

The rebuilt Bislett stadium saw the best javelin competition so far this season, with three men throwing over 87m. The defending World champion, Sergey Makarov of Russia, rose to second place with 87.76m. He passed the crowd favourite, Norway’s Olympic gold medallist Andreas Thorkildsen, in the final round. Thorkildsen’s mark of 87.66m is his PB and Norwegian record.

Pitkämäki won the first Golden League meet this year in Paris with 85.95m. At the dress rehearsal for the World Championships, the GP meet at the Olympic Stadium in Helsinki, he won with 85.66m. The Finnish national title was his in July with 87.83m. After Oslo, his average mark in finals this season was over 86.5 metres.

Pitkämäki has lost in only two competitions this year. In Ostrava in early June it was Sergey Makarov’s turn to win with a mark of 88.84m. At the Golden League meet in Rome, Andrus Värnik of Estonia, the 2003 World silver medallist was the winner.

At the World Championships in Helsinki, it will be difficult to beat Pitkämäki. No other athletes are more popular in Finland than javelin throwers, and the Finnish crowd will support their own with a true passion.

The experienced Makarov has performed consistently this year. At 32 years of age, he is the only other man to throw over 90m in 2005 – at the Russian championships in July, Makarov won with 90.33m.

Challengers at the World Championships include Thorkildsen and Värnik. Both have thrown over 87m this season. Värnik has been inconsistent though, following his Rome win he only managed in a winning result of 80.97m in the Estonian championships and then was left to 9th place in the Helsinki GP with only a 74.99m throw just before the World Championships. Breaux Greer of the United States threw 87.65m as early as April this year, but he has performed rather poorly since because of persistent injury which has dogged his career. At the US championships, his winning mark was under 80m.

Aleksandr Ivanov of Russia is another young thrower. He has been somewhat disappointing this year with a best mark of 84.24m. Aki Parviainen of Finland started the year with a win at Doha with 83.79m, but later his season has been marred by problems with his knees and his technique. The World champion from 1999 and silver medallist at Edmonton 2001 is still expected to reach the top eight in the final. The third Finn in the event is Arizona-based Esko Mikkola, 12th in the Olympic final last year.

Helsinki is very likely to be the last major championship for Jan Zelezny of the Czech Republic. At 39 years of age, Zelezny’s best result this year is 83.43m. In Oslo, his result was 82.70m.

In Athens, Vadims Vasiljevskis of Latvia surprised everyone by taking the Olympic silver. This year, 81.30m does earn him a place among the favourites in Helsinki. With a season best of 84.06m, Cuban Guillermo Martinez has the potential for a surprise and Canadian Scott Russell recently unleashed a big national record of 84.41m in late July, another possible surprise name in Helsinki.

Helsinki 2005 media team