Markku Uusipaavalniemi
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| Olympic medal record | |||
| Men's Curling | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Silver | 2006 Turin | Men's Curling | |
Markku Uusipaavalniemi (born November 23, 1966 in Karkkila) is a Finnish curler and politician.
Contents |
[edit] Personal
- Uusipaavalniemi lives in Hyvinkää with his wife and three children.
- His older brother Jussi taught him how to curl.
- He manages the Oulunkylä Curling Hall, one of Finland's few ice halls built specifically for curling.
- He was once the best mathematics student in Finland; as a high school senior, he had the top score in a nationwide test.
- He was once an excellent diver. In 1987, after training for just six months, he was ranked third in Finland. He gave up his university studies, and moved to Long Beach, California, where he was coached by two-time Olympic champion Sammy Lee. His goal was to make the 1992 Summer Olympics, but an injury wrecked these dreams, and he eventually had to retire due to financial concerns.
- He has also played Finnish baseball. Reportedly, he has been able throw the ball at 140 km/h, a feat only accomplished by a few of today's top players.
- He has successfully completed a Rubik's cube in 25 seconds.
- In 2005, Uusipaavalniemi was nicknamed M-15 — "M" derived from Markku and "15" being the number of letters in his last name — by an American player Pete Fenson not able to pronounce his name. A variant of this, U-15, is also commonly used. At the 2006 Winter Olympics, a Canadian competitor nicknamed him "Uusialphabet" for the same reason. In Finland, though, Uusis may be his most frequently used nickname.
- In September 20th 2006 he announced to be a candidate for Finnish parliament in the 2007 election for the Centre Party.[1]. Markku was elected along with three other members of his party from the Uusimaa constituency.
[edit] Current team
- Markku Uusipaavalniemi (Skip)
- Kalle Kiiskinen (Third)
- Jani Sullanmaa (Second)
- Teemu Salo (Lead)
- Jari Rouvinen (Alternate)
- Jari Laukkanen (Coach)
- Wille Mäkelä (Ex-third; Resigned from curling on March 1, 2006)
[edit] Career highlights
Uusipaavalniemi has been involved in international play for over two decades, and he has been the skip of Finland since the mid-1990s. All of Finland's curling medals have been achieved with Uusipaavalniemi as skip.
Uusipaavalniemi's team won the European championship in 2000. He is also two-time World Curling Championships bronze medalist (1998 and 2000) and two-time European Curling Championships bronze medalist (1999 and 2001).
Uusipaavalniemi's Finland team disappointingly finished fifth at the 2002 Olympic tournament.
In 2004, he and his somewhat altered Finland line-up pulled off the daunting task of securing qualification for the 2005 Ford World Men's Curling Championships from the 'B' competition at the European championships, where they languished following the country's relegation the previous season. To do this, they had to win the competition outright, and then overcome Russia in an additional play-off match.
At the 2005 World Championships, Uusipaavalniemi's team finished the round-robin tied for first place with five other teams on an 8-3 record. In the tie-breakers however, they were knocked out of contention by Canada's Randy Ferbey.
Also in 2005, Uusipaavalniemi won the first ever European Mixed Curling Championships with team mates Kirsi Nykänen, Teemu Salo and Tiina Kautonen in Andorra.
Uusipaavalniemi's Finland team won the round-robin at the 2006 Olympic tournament with a 7-2 record. They beat Great Britain 4-3 in the semi-final, with the last stone of the final end — thrown by Uusipaavalniemi — giving the Finns the deciding point. Finland lost the final to Canada 10-4 taking the silver medals.
Two weeks before the start of the 2006 World Men's Curling Championship in Lowell, Massachusetts, Uusipaavalniemi suffered a wrist injury that forced him to miss the team's first three games of the competition. He recovered enough to start playing in the fourth game, where he skipped and threw second rocks. He played out the rest of the competition throwing third rocks, but Finland did not make the playoff round, finishing tied for fifth with a 6-5 record.
Uusipaavalniemi returned to the 2007 Ford World Men's Curling Championship but his team got off to a rough start, losing their first two games and stringing together back-to-back wins only twice. Finland qualified for a tiebreaker with a 6-5 record, but lost to Germany 8-5 and finished sixth. Markku admitted that his recent campaign for (and eventual election to) Finnish parliament had forced him to cut back on curling practice time, perhaps contributing to the team's early struggles.
[edit] Awards
- Colin Campbell Award: 1998, 2003
