Bror-Erik "Bubi" Wallenius (born 1943) is a retired

Finnish Finnish may refer to: * Something or someone from, or related to Finland * Culture of Finland * Finnish people or Finns, the primary ethnic group in Finland * Finnish language, the national language of the Finnish people * Finnish cuisine See also ...

sports commentator In sports broadcasting, a sports commentator (also known as sports announcer or sportscaster) provides a real-time commentary of a game or event, usually during a live broadcast, traditionally delivered in the historical present tense. Radio was ...

who still occasionally works for Finland's National Broadcasting Company

YLE Yleisradio Oy (Finnish, literally "General Radio Ltd." or "General Broadcast Ltd."; abbr. Yle ; sv, Rundradion Ab, italics=no), translated to English as the Finnish Broadcasting Company, is Finland's national public broadcasting company, founde ...

. Wallenius had a great passion for sports since his childhood. When he was a little boy he organized sports competitions in

Kruununhaka Kruununhaka (; ) is a neighbourhood of Helsinki, the capital of Finland. Kruununhaka became the area next to the harbour and the center, when Helsinki was moved from the earlier location in the mid-1660s. From the very beginning, the residents i ...

Helsinki Helsinki ( or ; ; sv, Helsingfors, ) is the Capital city, capital, primate city, primate, and List of cities and towns in Finland, most populous city of Finland. Located on the shore of the Gulf of Finland, it is the seat of the region of U ...

, the neighbourhood where he lived, and collected entrance fees from the adults who came to attend. Wallenius learned to read when he was four years old, and practised speaking. He recited poetry in front of the class. In the 1960s he studied languages and social sciences in the

University of Helsinki The University of Helsinki ( fi, Helsingin yliopisto, sv, Helsingfors universitet, abbreviated UH) is a public research university located in Helsinki, Finland since 1829, but founded in the city of Turku (in Swedish ''Åbo'') in 1640 as the ...

. At the end of the 1970s Wallenius got job with the

Swedish Swedish or ' may refer to: Anything from or related to Sweden, a country in Northern Europe. Or, specifically: * Swedish language, a North Germanic language spoken primarily in Sweden and Finland ** Swedish alphabet, the official alphabet used by ...

sports editorial staff of YLE. Before that he had worked ten years as a salesman for IBM. Wallenius' first play-by-play sportscast was the women's 60 meters hurdles, which he watched from

videotape Videotape is magnetic tape used for storing video and usually sound in addition. Information stored can be in the form of either an analog or digital signal. Videotape is used in both video tape recorders (VTRs) and, more commonly, videocassett ...

, for

radio Radio is the technology of signaling and communicating using radio waves. Radio waves are electromagnetic waves of frequency between 30 hertz (Hz) and 300 gigahertz (GHz). They are generated by an electronic device called a transmit ...

. In the 1980s Wallenius worked mainly in the Swedish language sports staff, but also did some newsflashes for Finnish language sports news ''

Urheiluruutu {{Unreferenced, date=June 2019, bot=noref (GreenC bot) Urheiluruutu is a daily sports magazine produced and broadcast by Finnish Broadcasting Company Yle. The programme originally launched on August 18, 1962. The sportsreader was Anssi Kukkonen a ...

''. In Swedish he sportscasted the

1988 Winter Olympics The 1988 Winter Olympics, officially known as the XV Olympic Winter Games (french: XVes Jeux olympiques d'hiver) and commonly known as Calgary 1988 ( bla, Mohkínsstsisi 1988; sto, Wîchîspa Oyade 1988 or ; cr, Otôskwanihk 1998/; srs, Guts� ...

Calgary Calgary ( ) is the largest city in the western Canadian province of Alberta and the largest metro area of the three Prairie Provinces. As of 2021, the city proper had a population of 1,306,784 and a metropolitan population of 1,481,806, makin ...

, among others. In the beginning of the 1990s he made a permanent move to the Finnish side of sport staff. The first sportscasts were mainly

cross-country skiing Cross-country skiing is a form of skiing where skiers rely on their own locomotion to move across snow-covered terrain, rather than using ski lifts or other forms of assistance. Cross-country skiing is widely practiced as a sport and recreation ...

competitions. Nowadays Wallenius commentates every sport. He usually commentates

athletics Athletics may refer to: Sports * Sport of athletics, a collection of sporting events that involve competitive running, jumping, throwing, and walking ** Track and field, a sub-category of the above sport * Athletics (physical culture), competiti ...

together with

Antero Mertaranta Lauri Antero Johannes Mertaranta (born 17 January 1956 in Hyvinkää, Finland) is a prominent Finnish sportscaster and TV personality and former elementary school teacher. Antero Mertaranta is best known for his energetic announcing in IIHF World ...

basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular Basketball court, court, compete with the primary objective of #Shooting, shooting a basketball (ball), basketball (appr ...

with a

colour commentator A color commentator or expert commentator is a sports commentator who assists the main (play-by-play) commentator, typically by filling in when play is not in progress. The phrase "colour commentator" is primarily used in Canadian English and the ...

(

Jukka Toijala Jukka Toijala (born 9 May 1972) is a Finnish professional basketball coach and former player, currently serving as the coach for HBA-Marsky Helsinki, and the Estonia men's national basketball team. Coaching career Club coaching career From 2010 ...

and Henrik Dettman in the 2000s), and skiing with color commentator too (

Juha Mieto Juha Iisakki Mieto (born 20 November 1949) is a Finnish former cross-country skier, who was born in Kurikka. He competed in the 1972, 1976, 1980 and 1984 Olympics and won five medals, including a gold medal in the 4 × 10 km relay in 1976 ...

, Pekka Vähäsöyrinki and

Kari Ristanen Kari Ristanen (born 27 July 1958) was a Finnish cross-country skier who competed during the 1980s. He won a bronze medal in the 4 × 10 km relay at the 1984 Winter Olympics in Sarajevo. Ristanen also won a silver in the 4 × 10 km rela ...

in the 2000s). In the skiing season 2006/2007 Wallenius himself had made a move to a colour commentator, and the main play-by-play commentator was a young

Jussi Eskola Jussi () is a male given name. In Finnish originally it is short for Juhani or Juho, Finnish for Johannes/John, but is also recognized as a name in its own right for official purposes. It can also be short for Justus, or a Finnish form of Justin. ...

. In the 1990s Wallenius also commentated

ice hockey Ice hockey (or simply hockey) is a team sport played on ice skates, usually on an ice skating rink with lines and markings specific to the sport. It belongs to a family of sports called hockey. In ice hockey, two opposing teams use ice hock ...

, and

football Football is a family of team sports that involve, to varying degrees, kicking a ball to score a goal. Unqualified, the word ''football'' normally means the form of football that is the most popular where the word is used. Sports commonly c ...

so far as the second half of the 2000s. He was one of the main commentators in

FIFA World Cup The FIFA World Cup, often simply called the World Cup, is an international association football competition contested by the senior men's national teams of the members of the ' ( FIFA), the sport's global governing body. The tournament ha ...

s and

UEFA European Football Championship The UEFA European Football Championship, less formally the European Championship and informally the Euro, is the primary association football tournament organised by the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA). The competition is contes ...

. In the

2006 FIFA World Cup The 2006 FIFA World Cup, also branded as Germany 2006, was the 18th FIFA World Cup, the quadrennial international football world championship tournament. It was held from 9 June to 9 July 2006 in Germany, which had won the right to host the ...

he wasn't anymore a play-by-play commentator, but had his own intermission show ''Bubin vaihtopenkki'' ("Bubi's substitution bench") where he discussed about the events in football with many celebrity guests and football personalities. "Bubi" has also commentated many other kind of sports, like strong man competitions. The commentating style of Wallenius is very restful, genial and philosophic. This arouses many kinds of opinions among sports fans. Many people consider him a "walking sport encyclopedia", but others think he is a boring chatterer. The integral part of his style is to tell simple things in quite complex ways and fall into very deep philosophic contemplation. He has spoken up for his calm analytic style by saying that shouting should only be done in the

army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...

and by the

police The police are a constituted body of persons empowered by a state, with the aim to enforce the law, to ensure the safety, health and possessions of citizens, and to prevent crime and civil disorder. Their lawful powers include arrest and t ...

. Wallenius had been married twice, but has been a bachelor for the last 20 years. He retired in December 2008.

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Wallenius, Bror-Erik Association football commentators Finnish sports broadcasters Swedish-speaking Finns 1943 births Living people IBM employees Place of birth missing (living people) University of Helsinki alumni Sportspeople from Helsinki