Lillehammer calling

Skill Challenge fulfils dreams of 30 young athletes

10.07.2015
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Sebastian Cederle from Slovakia, who finished second in the men’s competition, is among the 16 boys and 16 girls who are qualified for the 2016 Youth Olympic Winter Games. Photo: Toni Saarinen

VIERUMAKI – Competitors were kept at the edge of their seats until the end as 30 boys and girls celebrate their places at the Winter Youth Olympic Games as the Global Skills Challenge Summit came to a close.

While Erik Betzold from Germany and Norway's Millie Rose Sirum claimed top spot in the male and female competition respectively, there were more tense moments further down the ranks as the final ranking was kept confidential until the closing ceremony of the 14th IIHF Hockey Development Camp, held simultaneously with the Global Skill Challenge Summit at the Finnish Sports Institute in Vierumaki.

Participants in the Global Skills Challenge Summit brought together 36 boys and 31 girls from 36 different countries. During the three-day event individual skills were put to a test where the prize at stake was a place at the 2016 Winter Youth Olympic Games in Lillehammer in February next year.

Six individual skill tests – Fastest Lap, Shooting Accuracy, Skating Agility, Puck Control, Hardest Shot and Passing Precision – were each competed in a knockout stage.

With the points ratio for each skill ranging on a falling scale of five points for winning an event down to one point for qualifying to the second round, it was also a competition where the participants’ mathematical skills came to good use.

"We were showed the results after three skills, so I was leading then and after that I just kept adding my points, so I knew around the end of the competition the points that I had," said Betzold, who won the men's competition ahead of Slovakia's Sebastian Cederle and Norway's Sander Hurrod.

"It is a good feeling to win this competition and it will be an honour to represent my country at the Olympics in Lillehammer," said the centre who also plays in Germany's under-16 national team.

Thanks to a number of tightly fought contests and competitors on even points, there was an air of uncertainly all the way to the end which helped adding excitement to the event.

Two such examples being Romania's two representatives, Eduard Casaneanu and Diana-Alexandra Iuga, who finished 15th and 16th respectively and who both were fully unaware of their fate as future Olympians until the announcement was made at the closing ceremony.

Norway, who in their position as hosts already qualified to the Skills Challenge at the 2016 Youth Olympic Winter Games, were invited to take part at the competition at Vierumaki as a preparatory event and seem to be in good stead of what is to come.

"I had trained a lot off ice before I got here, so I expected it to be tough," said Norway's female participant Millie Rose Sirum, who won the female competition in emphatic fashion.

Winning here favourite skill, Fastest Shot, on the third day, she admitted there’s still some room to sharpen her skills in a number of events such as Shooting Accuracy, where the task is to hit all four corners of the net in 30 seconds.

"I got zero in that skill," she said. "I was so bad at that and when things did not work out I started to get really mad at myself for not hitting the target."

In the end her overall skills did the talking and now she can look forward to what is to come, competing on home ice where the experience will be different.

"I now know all of my competitors so that is great. But in Lillehammer I will be more nervous but I will also be playing games at the same time, " she said being part of the Norway team that will be taking part in the women’s ice hockey tournament at the 2016 Youth Olympics.

One who knows all about the travails of multi-tasking is Inaki Cruz Ceballos. Representing Mexico in both the Skills Challenge Summit while also taking part at the IIHF Hockey Development Camp in Vierumaki as a player took its toll.

"It's exciting to be chosen by my country to represent them here, as I can learn from other countries," he said. "But being in the Skills Challenge and the Development Camp is also tiring, physically as well as mentally tiring, so yes, it did affect me a bit," said Cruz Ceballos.

The 2016 Youth Olympic Winter Games will be in held in Lillehammer, 12-21 February 2016 and it will be the second of its kind. The inaugural competition took place in Innsbruck, Austria, in 2012.

Click here to watch a video on the camp and skills challenge.

Global Skills Challenge Summit

Final Ranking Men:
1. Erik Betzold, Germany
2. Sebastian Cederle, Slovakia
3. Sander Hurrod, Norway
4. Benjamin Baumgartner, Austria
5. Antonin Plagnat, France
6. Aleks Haatanen, Finland
7. Natan Vertes, Hungary
8. Carson Focht, Canada
9. Andrei Pavlenko, Belarus
10. Jake Riley, Australia
11. Dino Mukovoz, Lithuania
12. Ties van Soest, Netherlands
13. Mu-Hsin Hsieh, Chinese Taipei
14. Roi Kanda, Japan
15. Eduard Casaneanu, Romania
16. Oliver Curtis, New Zealand

Final Ranking Women:
1. Millie Rose Sirum, Norway
2. Sena Takenaka, Japan
3. Madison Poole, Australia
4. Kristine Melberg, Denmark
5. Tabea Botthof, Germany
6. Anita Muraro, Italy
7. Theresa Schafzahl, Austria
8. SuYeon Eom, Korea
9. Kiia Nousiainen, Finland
10. Chinouk van Calster, Belgium
11. Martina Federova, Slovakia
12. Maree Dijkema, Netherlands
13. Daria Maximchik, Belarus
14. Verity Lewis, Great Britain
15. Katarzyna Wybiral, Poland
16. Diana-Alexandra Iuga, Romania

Full Results: Men, Women

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