Frans Salmi wins silver in the taekwondo poomsae in the European Universities Championships

The EUC Martial Arts Championships took place in Warsaw, Poland. The best Finnish performer was Frans Salmi from the University of Vaasa, who won silver in the taekwondo poomsae. The victory went to France’s Pierre-Malo Tranchant, who also won the European Championship earlier this year.

Salmi was happy with his performance, even though he had not trained much during the summer. Experience and years of confidence contributed to the success.

“The judges asked me if I was going to change to another series soon, as I have been attending since ‘forever’. The first few rounds I played it safe. In the semi-final, however, I took a bolder tactic to show the judges I wanted to win,” Salmi says.

In the women’s poomsae, Linda Räkköläinen from the University of Helsinki went out in the quarter-finals and Anna Alatalo in the second round. In the matches, Ada Gustafsson (University of Helsinki) lost by a narrow margin during the first round.

This year, Finns were less successful in judo and karate. Judoka Ella Ollikainen (Savonia University of Applied Sciences) was knocked out in the first match. In karate, Maria Hintikka and Otso Järvinen from the University of Tampere were eliminated after the first kata round and Veikko Peltola, also from Tampere, after his first match.

Finns in four other sports

In football, Liikunnan Riemu from the University of Jyväskylä won the tough preliminary pool with two wins and one loss. In the quarter-finals, the University of Timisoara from Romania was a tougher opponent and eventually won the gold medal. The Finns finished eighth.

The futsal matches were played in Zagreb, Croatia, and Finland was represented by as many as three teams. Unfortunately, none of them made it to the finals. In the men’s competitions, LUT University won one match in the tournament and finished 16th.

In the women’s competitions, the University of Tampere ranked 10th and the University of Jyväskylä 13th. The matches in the first rounds were tight, but the opponents performed better in the decisive moments, especially in the matches played by the Tampere team, whose four points were not enough to qualify.

The EUC Orienteering Championships took place in Lodz, Poland, and did not result in any medals for Finns. Niklas Heikkilä from Åbo Akademi was the best Finn in the sprint competition, finishing 27th. Eetu Korhonen (University of Helsinki) was 43rd, Juho Hiltunen (Aalto University) 45th, Aatu Hirvikallio (Metropolia University of Applied Sciences) 48th, and Tuomas Rokka (Aalto University) dropped out.

The best Finn in the middle distance competition was Juho Hiltunen, who was placed 24th. The winner, Jakub Chaloupsky from the Czech Republic, finished seven minutes ahead. Eetu Korhonen was 35th, Aatu Hirvikallio 40th, Tuomas Rokka 42nd, and Niklas Heikkilä dropped out.

The EUC Tennis Championships were played in a very hot weather Coimbra in Portugal. In the team competition, Tuomas Rikkonen from Åbo Akademi and August Ehrnrooth from Hanken School of Economics ranked ninth. In the preliminary round, they were one win behind the top group but improved their game and won the bottom group. The winner of the tournament was the University of Regensburg in Germany, to whom the Finns lost in the preliminary round.

Next year, the summer sports championships will be held at the European Universities Games in Salerno, Italy.