LAUSANNE – Former Finnish national team player Emma Terho is one of the six candidates for two positions in the IOC Athletes’ Commission to be elected by the athletes during the 2018 Olympic Winter Games.

The IOC Executive Board today approved the candidatures of six winter sports athletes for the election who were nominated by their respective National Olympic Committees: Astrid Uhrenholdt JACOBSEN (NOR) (skiing/cross-country); Ander MIRAMBELL (ESP) (skeleton); Kikkan RANDALL (USA) (skiing/cross-country); Emma TERHO (FIN) (ice hockey); Hong ZHANG (CHN) (skating/speed-skating); and Armin ZOEGGELER (ITA) (luge).

Emma Terho (nee Laaksonen), 35, played in the top Finnish league for Espoo for 15 years in addition to four years of NCAA hockey at the Ohio State University and one season for SKIF Nizhni Novgorod in Russia. She represented Finland in five Olympic Winter Games – every edition since the inclusion of women’s ice hockey in Nagano 1998 – and in eight IIHF Ice Hockey Women’s World Championships. She won bronze medals at the 1998 and 2010 Olympics and in four World Championships. The mother of two had a break on the ice but staged a comeback during the recent Finnish playoffs with Espoo United.

After continuing her studies in Finland, she has been working in the finance sector but also become active off the ice in sports as a member of the IIHF Women’s Committee since 2016, as the first female board member of the Finnish Ice Hockey Association since 2014 and as a member since 2006 and most recently as the chairperson of the Finnish Olympic Committee’s Athletes’ Commission.

Two positions at the IOC Athletes’ Commission will become available when the eight-year mandates of current chairwoman and long-time U.S. ice hockey national team player Angela Ruggiero and member Adam Pengilly end next February.

“I am delighted with the calibre of candidates running for a place in the IOC Athletes’ Commission. I have every confidence in each candidate to strongly represent athletes in the Olympic Movement and continue the excellent work of the IOC Athletes’ Commission to date. I wish all of them the best of luck, and urge all Olympians competing in PyeongChang next year to vote for the candidates they wish to represent them on the IOC,” Ruggiero said.

– with files from the IOC