This week’s Member Federation spotlight shines on Estonia, a country with a growing reputation for staging European Athletics events
When Erich Teigamägi became President of the Estonian Athletic Association in 2006, he had a plan to bring some of the sport’s major events to his country. The vision is now the reality.
“I said our dream is to organise the European Junior Championships in 2011 and it became true,” recalls Teigamägi. “The logical next step for me and the organisation was the European U23 Championships and last summer that happened too.”
Does that mean they are planning a bid for the European Athletics Championships themselves?
“At the moment, to analyse our possibilities, we do not have such a big stadium, even to renovate it,” says Teigamägi.
“It is not possible to have the capacity of seats. Secondly, there are not the same hotel standards needed that say Helsinki and Amsterdam have and the budget of 15 million euros that you need is not that easy to put together in Estonia.
“So, there are two or three major problems but of course, never say never. Maybe in 10 years or so, our country will want to prove that we are ready.”
Estonia plays a major role every year on the European Athletics scene because of its determination to bring international track and field to the people.
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In the past 12 years, along with the European Juniors and European Under-23s, it has staged European Cups, European Team Championships and European Combined Events, to name but a few. Tallinn also staged the most important corporate event with the European Athletics Convention at the end of 2013.
“We stage events to be a part of European athletics, to be part of world athletics, to give our people a challenge – otherwise life is quite regular with all the same events each year, the same schedule, almost the same people,” says Teigamägi.
“(We do it) To make life more interesting for those working in this field in Estonia and who want to be connected with international organisations and it gives people who are not linked with athletics every day, the chance to be part of the sport on the continental level.
“The juniors and under-23 championships were really big events and it was also a challenge to organise the end of year European Athletics Convention in 2013.”
As with last year’s European Athletics U23 Championships, the majority of competitions are staged in Tallinn, the capital, and at the Kadriorg Stadium, and with each one, the greater the knowledge means a greater understanding of how it works.
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Teigamägi says: “Our experience from 2011 gave us more confidence to organise the under-23s after staging the European juniors.
“We knew what problems to expect, not that we had any major ones, but we could anticipate how to deal with them.
“The most important thing we learned is simple: during these type of events, the most important people are the athletes. We have to arrange meals, transportation from the stadium, and all things like that. Always there are side things – opening and closing ceremonies, dinners with VIPs – but the competition has to be the priority.”
Tallinn remains the home of such events because logistics says it has to.
“Estonia has approximately 1.3 million people, half of those live in the north of the country, with 400,000 in Tallinn,” says Teigamägi. “But we have the only international airport in Tallinn.
“The next city we can organise some of these competitions is Tartu, which is the second biggest city in Estonia, but as it is 186km from Tallinn, it makes transportation a problem.
“Tallinn has enough hotels to accommodate athletes, guests, organisations, journalists and technical personnel.
“Maybe the smaller competitions, like matches between Baltic States, can be held outside Tallinn but mostly because of logistical reasons it is Tallinn. Our city centre is three kilometres from the airport and our stadium is 1-2 kilometres from major hotels. Everything is almost in walking distance.
“From a European perspective, it is a small capital city but for Estonia, Tallinn is big.”
If the European Athletics Championships is not yet on the agenda, the SPAR European Cross Country Championships might be.
Teigamägi says: “Maybe five or six years ago, I was thinking that December is too cold, then I saw in Budapest (2012) it was minus-8, so probably the European Cross is one of the competitions we can consider organising in the future.”
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EUROPEAN ATHLETICS EVENTS THAT ESTONIA HAS STAGED SINCE 2010
2010
European Cup Combined Events Super League
2011
European Athletics Junior Championships
2013
European Cup Combined Events Super League; European Athletics Convention
2014
European Athletics Team Championships First League
2015
European Athletics U23 Championships