Teen 'stoked' to be on board with Team Finland

TAMPERE, Finland — Traveling to skateboard competitions around the world, 13-year-old Heili Sirvio — Finland's youngest Olympic athlete ever — leads a life unlike the average Finnish teen.

With a focused expression and her blonde ponytail peeking out from under her helmet, Sirvio set off down a half-pipe on her skateboard, seconds later she spun around in the air while grabbing her board before sticking the landing with ease.

"I am really stoked to be able to represent my country and hopefully make them proud," the young skateboarder said during a break between training sessions at a skatepark in the Finnish city of Tampere.

The visit to her native Finland was only a short pit stop for Sirvio, who lives in California and who has spent a lot of time traveling in recent years.

Less than a month before the Olympic Games — which will be held in Paris from July 26 to Aug 11 — Sirvio made a stop in Tampere for the Finnish skateboarding championships, after which the family planned on heading to a skatepark in southern Sweden for more training.

"We have been pretty much living on the road for the past two years," her father Fredrik Sirvio said.

Jumping from training sites to Olympic qualifiers around the globe, the entire family has been fully devoted to Sirvio's Olympic pursuits.

"Eat breakfast, go to the skatepark, have lunch, come back, have a little rest and swim in the lake and back to the skatepark," he said, summing up the day's itinerary.

Now competing as one of the world's top skateboarders, Sirvio first stepped on a skateboard only four years ago.

Lockdown activity

The family moved to Australia in 2020 to escape Finland's cold and dark winter months.

Feeling bored indoors during pandemic-enforced lockdowns, Sirvio's little sister Miila spotted their dad's skateboard in the house and suggested the sisters try out the skatepark.

"We started to pick it up and it was really fun, and from then I have just been skating," said Sirvio, who is still accompanied by her 10-year-old sister at the skatepark every day.

"As parents, we have to tell the girls every once in a while that is a good time to take a day off and do something else other than skateboarding," their father said with a laugh.

When Sirvio found success in local competitions and the Australian championships — considered one of the world's top skateboarding tournaments — it sparked a dream of the Olympics.

A real possibility

Being a former professional snowboarder, her father realized there was a real possibility that Sirvio could qualify for the Olympics if she continued progressing.

"These things do not happen many times in your lifetime, so we decided 'let's do it and give it all we have'," he said.

Leaving their Australian home in Brisbane behind, the family of four began traveling to competitions all over the world, and sought out the best training sites.

They established a new home base in California — the birthplace of skateboarding.

"In California, Heili skates and meets with some of the world's living skateboard legends," her father explained.

Homeschooling and managing work remotely enable the lifestyle: usually the sisters study in the mornings and then skateboard the rest of the day.

Ranked 14th of the 22 selected athletes in the women's park event, Sirvio will skate on a course consisting of bowls and bends at Place de la Concorde on Aug 6.

"Hopefully we bring home a medal from the Olympics, that would mean a lot to me," she said with a smile.

Skateboarding made its debut as an Olympic sport at Tokyo 2020 and is divided into park and street competitions, with the latter taking place on a street-like course.

AFP