Paavo the Great. Great Race. Great Dream. (Finnish: Paavo Suuri. Suuri juoksu. Suuri uni.) is an opera in three acts by Finnish composer Tuomas Kantelinen to a libretto by the poet Paavo Haavikko.[1] The opera deals with the life of the Finnish middle- and long-distance runner Paavo Nurmi who won a total of nine Olympic gold medals in the 1920s. It was premiered in the Helsinki Olympic Stadium in 2000 as Helsinki was one of the European Capitals of Culture. The title refers to Nurmi's great ambition to win the marathon race at the 1940 Helsinki Olympics, which were not held because of the outbreak of World War II.[2]