Ott Tänak - Future champion?

[Allez Andruet]

You don't know what you have till it's gone. Finnish rally fans will learn that the hard way.

[Hartusvuori]

its crazy how much people already are cheering and loving Kalle there, it feels like they are almost certain he will be a champion one day.

Yep. Talking about being ahead of things.

Kalle phenomenon attracts mostly sports fans that are slightly interested in rallying, relates heavily to the Finnish heritage of success and also value any sport only by the recent success in it by the countrymen. While on Rally Finland stages, Kalle's name was heard the most of times, but for the real die hard rally fans, it's more down to earth. Of course we believe in his talent and that the talent could bring success, but we also know that one doesn't win championships by just turning in. OK, Ott and Kalle have greatly different backgrounds to rallying, but while Ott is now (and have been for few years) on the top of his game, this topic with that subject title was started already in 2011. There are no straight fastforward ways to the absolute top.

[Allez Andruet]

Kalle phenomenon attracts mostly sports fans that are slightly interested in rallying, relates heavily to the Finnish heritage of success and also value any sport only by the recent success in it by the countrymen.

Kalle is already a household name in Finland. Football and ice hockey aside, all sports crave for those kind of cash cows. As you wrote, if it wasn't for Kalle, some of the people spectating Rally Finland might have stayed at home. Small percentage of those Kalle fans will hopefully turn into "real" rally fans at some point, so it's a win-win.

[janvanvurpa]

Don't it always seem to go that You don't know what you have till it's gone. Finnish rally fans will learn that the hard way.

They paved Paradise, and put up a parking lot*..

Great Joni Mitchell song!
Great because its so true..


* last weekend whole family we were up hiking at Paradise between 1600 to 2000m

[swanny]

They paved Paradise, and put up a parking lot*..]

Sorry, OT Thought you were going to be talking about Pikes Peak....

[janvanvurpa]

Sorry, OT Thought you were going to be talking about Pikes Peak....

No, that was a tragedy and a loss but realistically its just one very wide and very fast stage..so smooth it may as well have been ass-fault..
And since most Americans are not interested in a driving challenge and never have been (in any great numbers) making it ass-fault the whole way to the top means
everybody can do what Americans want to to and do do so well: look at shiny "stuff" somebody else has bought...lots of shiny stuff and lots of overweight guys talking about the shiny stuff somebody else bought and how totally awesome the person who bought the shiny stuff is on the podcast...and never forgetting to tell you every 15-17 minutes that the event is the most awesome-est car race in the world...all the while talking to the camera telling you how awesome it is while not showing you no, while walking around looking at camera.*


*I swear to God I just saw something exactly like this just yesterday only it was my old sport I did for so long which is moto-cross...Its 50 year anniversary of racing at what is really the best American mx track, Unadilla, in New York state...scene of many hard fights, scene of many World Championship events.. 30m + of a guy strolling the pits "Hey howya doing? Awesome!" and eventually strolling a part of the famous track--with camera aimed directly at the guy 99% of the time..with him TELLING you endlessly "It was so awesome"

Not showing you with old clips of notable races or even famous photos of the men who raced..

A talking head talking about what others men have done...and telling you how awesome the machines were "They were awesome"

Perfect American media production..

[robertr]

As an Estonian rally fan and also a big fan of Tänak, I feel quite often in here that some guys go too far. It's okay to love Tänak, but sometimes it feels like some users are IN LOVE with him.

[robertr]

I will try to explain, why Ott Tänak is so popular in Estonia.

First of all, we are quite tiny country, around 1,3 million people, out of which about 1 million are Estonians.

We don't have internationally famous bands, artists, movie stars, so top athletes are our best known celebrities.

Like I said, Estonia is a small country and every athlete who reaches the top level, will become very popular in Estonia.

In the late 80s-early 90s, most popular athlete was Erika Salumäe who won 2 Olympic golds in track cycling. She has been chosen 9 times as the Athlete of the Year in Estonia. Okay, she had nice achievements, but track cycling is nothing that would attract the masses. In Estonia, I don't know anyone else who has even tried track cycling, beside the 2 times Olympic winner Ms. Salumäe.

Then we had decathlete Erki Nool, who won the olympic gold in 2000. Decathlon is an extremely tough sports to do, also not very popular. But during that time, everyone in Estonia was an expert in decathlon and knew how to calculate the points.

From the late 90s until 2010 Cross-country skiing was immensely popular in Estonia, our athletes got multiple gold medals from the winter olympics and I remember that when I was in high school, school was cancelled for one day, so everyone could watch our top skiiers fight for the medals in 2006 Turin winter olympics. These years are now considered taboo and big national shame, as the success was most probably fueled by doping - main skiiers found good lawyers and were never convicted, but now one reallt doubts their guilt.

From 2000 to 2005 we had Markko Märtin in WRC. Rally has always been very popular, even in the soviet times. And when Markko started getting good results in WRC, first Estonian rallymania started. Our most successful athletes had been either very strong or with a good stamina, Markko was the first one to prove that Estonians can be trusted to operate a really fast machinery at really high speed. And he was the first one to really earn big money. Markko had something mysterious about him - really quiet, rarely giving interviews, nothing known about his private life. Also the tragic end of his career only added to his legend. He has been influential in the rally circles even after retiring and has had a huge role in the Ott's success. He is also a successful businessman and that earns respect in the eyes of Estonians.

Then we had discus thrower Gerd Kanter. He was really popular, very consistent and result oriented, 12 medals from big title competitions, his personal best marks the 3rd best result of all time. Also a very intelligent and pleasant person, a really good role model for everyone. He stopped his career recently and is still very much respected in Estonia. But once again, discus throwing is not really a sport for the masses.

Maybe the most surprising one is the story of Baruto. Estonian guy who ended up being one of the top sumo wrestlers. From 2004-2013 every Estonian sports fan knew the words sekiwaki, Ōzeki, yokozuna etc. His career was unfortunately ended by a nasty knee injury. He is still a celebrity in Japan and Estonia, but his recent foray into politics will probably tarnish his star.

We've had 1 guy in NBA (not too successful), 1 guy in NFL (moderately succesful, at some point every Estonian sports fan was following US football league), 1 top footballer (2 year in Liverpool, but not too often in the starting lineup).

And now it's the era of Ott. Even if he never becomes world champ, he will remain a huge star in Estonia. We don't really have any other succesful athletes at the moment (1 javelin guy might become, but once again, not too popular sports discipline). Estonians had been yearning for a new WRC driver since Markko's retirement. We had Urmo Aava for a while, but he was not that good. Everyone had huge expectations for Ott, then he fucked up...twice...so now, when he is at his peak and driving a fast car, every Estonian is happy. And since we have now online media, social media etc, the craze around Ott is much bigger than it was for Markko. I also think that Ott's rough start in WRC has supported his popularity - he used to be the ridiculed underdog, and now he is the top guy, calling the shots, posing with Akio Toyoda, driving F1 and earning big buck. I think Estonians are genuinly happy for him, which is a rare thing, as Estonians are not the friendliest of people.

Long story short - we are a tiny nation and desperate for heroes. Now Ott is our hero.

[tr4m]

As an Estonian rally fan and also a big fan of Tänak, I feel quite often in here that some guys go too far. It's okay to love Tänak, but sometimes it feels like some users are IN LOVE with him.

What is too far? Not trying to argue, just honestly curious as I'm not in any Estonian rally community and ignore the comment section in news articles, for obvious reasons.. In my opinion too far is hurting the sport or athlete, not "calling names".
Obviously badmouthing Ogier and especially Neuville seems to be popular among Estonians, but there's no other driver that has been bullied by Estonian "fans" more than Tänak himself.

[EstWRC]

The wait is almost over!
Ott Tänak Movie is going global on October 1st on VOD:
tanakmovie.com
The film is translated into 9 languages.
Fasten your seatbelts and get ready for the ride!


https://tanakmovie.com/?fbclid=IwAR1...to2uGjhTLR7M_I