BREAKING NEWS - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Midnight Sun Festival winning couple brings home Silver
Medal from World Wife-Carrying Championships in Finland
Saturday, July 1, 2017
Tom Kuutti
SONKAJARVI, Finland - Mischa Freystaetter and his wife, Rie Takano, won the Midnight Sun
Festival Wife-Carrying Contest in Lake Worth last March, qualifying them for the World
Championships in Finland.
“We’ve been training hard and are really excited to be representing Florida for the first time at
the World Championships,” Mischa said in a YouTube interview before leaving for Finland. “This
is my first time visiting Finland so it’s going to be great,” said Rie. Mischa stands a towering
6’ 8” tall and stays in top shape by competing in Frisbee at a world class level. “His long legs are
definitely an advantage going over the log hurdles,” Rie explained. “It really helps that Rie only
weighs 105 pounds,” Mischa added.
The legend behind this unique and traditionally Finnish sporting event dates back to the 1800’s,
when “Ronkainen the Robber” and his gang supposedly pillaged Finnish villages and took the
women. Modern day wife carrying competitions started in 1992 and the popularity of the sport
has grown ever since. Thirteen states and two Canadian provinces now hold wife-carrying
competitions.
The regulation course is 280 yards long and has two dry obstacles, such as a log hurdle, as well
as a “widow maker” water obstacle. Competitors don’t have to be legally married and they can
choose how the wife is carried – including piggyback, the over-the-shoulder fireman’s carry,
and the newly popular “Estonian carry,” in which the woman is carried upside down holding
onto her partner’s back with her legs around his neck. “I like the Estonian carry, because when
Rie holds on, it leaves my arms free to pump when I’m running,” Mischa explained.
The World Championships took place in Sonkajarvi, Finland, on Saturday, July 1, 2017. Misha
and Rie beat out the majority of an international field of 90 competitors in 45 teams to win the
Silver Medal. Their time in the 280 yard long obstacle course was 1:10.94, a mere 2.3 seconds
behind gold medal winners Taisto Miettinen and Kristiina Haapanen, of Finland. Ilpo Haalisto
and Jenni Piippo, of Finland, took the bronze with a time of 1:12.22.
Athletes from 15 different countries flew to Finland to take part in this fun-filled sporting event,
including Switzerland, Australia, Sweden, Germany, Singapore, England, Canada, Israel, Austria
and many others. The U.S. was well represented in the World Championships. The 2016 North
American Champions, Elliot and Giana Storey, of Westbrook, Maine, finished 4th, just a heartPage 1
BREAKING NEWS - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
breaking 0.7 seconds behind the bronze medalists. Lim Rebekah, from Houston, teamed up
with Teemu Salminen of Finland to finish in 10th place. John Lund, from Boston, and his partner,
Stephanie Weisseiseu, from Austria, came in 13th. Mischa’s brother, Peter, and his wife Sheila,
both from Florida, finished a respectable 28th.
This year’s gold medalists, Taisto Miettinen and his partner Kristiina Haapanen, became world
champions for a record 6th time. This might lead you to think that Taisto and his partner are
unbeatable. The Florida Championship Wife-Carrying audience knows better. They saw Mischa
beat Taisto in March, 2017, setting up what could become a very exciting rivalry. “We won the
gold in Florida last March, beating Taisto and his partner. Now Taisto beat us for the gold in
Finland. This is going to be a really fun rivalry. I look forward to a rematch in Florida in March of
2018,” Mischa said.
Taisto and Kristiina are known to many Americans for taking on former NFL star Michael
Strahan and Kelly Ripa in a one-on-one wife-carrying challenge on national television. After
Taisto and Kristiina handily won, Strahan, with Kelly still on his back, good-naturedly accepted
defeat by humorously kicking over the cones at the finish line. “It was fun to challenge a famous
football player,” said Taisto.
For now, Mischa and Rie are enjoying their Silver Medal. “I was born in the U.S. but my Mom is
from Finland,” Mischa explained, “so I have a lot of cousins and family members in Finland.
Many of them came out to cheer me on, and having my brother and his wife in the competition
with me was great. But, nothing beats bringing the Silver Medal home to Florida!”
Nothing … except maybe the gold next year!
For more information on wife-carrying competitions, visit
midnightsunfest.org/wifecarrying
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For more information, contact:
Tom Kuutti
President
Midnight Sun Festival, Inc.
P.O. Box 907
Lake Worth, Florida 33460
Cell: 561-758-6585
Email: [email protected]
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