Season opening without the Meransen Start Cup and with many uncertainties
In this weird summer in which time seems
almost suspended due to the pandemic, after 28 years, the season of the Italian
national luge team hasn't open with the Gitschberg Start Cup in Meransen.
The health situation forced the FIL to redefine
the calendar and the competition procedures for the upcoming pre-Olympic
season 2020/21.
The competitions will take place only in
Europe, except the final, that has necessarily to take place on the new
Olympic track, ready for Beijing 2022. The stages of Lake Placid (USA) and
Pyeong Chang (KOR) and the World Championships in Whistler (CAN) have been
canceled.
Igls and Oberhof will host two stages of
the World Cup, while the World Championships will take place in Königssee.
We meet the team during a training session in the gymnasium of Meransen. Temperature control and releases to be filled in for everyone. Observing the athletes, a smile escapes when you realize that the most concentrated during the workout is the only one who won't have to compete in about two months: the Technical Director Armin Zöggeler, who continues to keep fit despite having hung up the sled since a long time. “We had to give up the trip to Lillehammer because Norway has closed the borders and for now the track will not be iced. We will probably go to Sigulda at the beginning of October, but first we'll have to do a few days of training - from September 22nd to 25th- on the start track of Cesana. President Roda asked us to do this, since both bobsleigh and skeleton teams are using it, he wants us to go too. " Armin tells us.
"... of course, now that
the start track in Meransen is frozen, travel 1000 km to go to Turin
doesn't make much sense ..." the athletes mutter in chorus.
The season kicks off between doubts and a few certainties. The team finished very well last season and starts as holder of the title in the Team Relay. Even Fischnaller, without the disqualification in the Whistler Sprint cup, due to the temperature of the skates and not to his mistake, would have won the overall standing. Verena Hofer, Marion Oberhofer, Nina Zöggeler and Leon Felderer are now fully part of the senior team, bringing new lymph to the group in which a little more internal competition can only do well.
On the international front, the return of Geisenberger and Eitberger is being prepared. We will see if the new moms will return to the former levels, making women's competitions a Teutonic monopoly again, even if, talking about this some time ago, Gerda Weisensteiner told us she is very skeptical about it: "When you become a mother, your priorities change and throw yourself headlong down an icy track is no longer so easy with a child waiting for you at home ”.
As for non-Europeans, the question is
still whether they will manage to be there or not.
“According to the indications we have
received, the season will take place behind closed doors,” tells
us Ludwig Rieder. “We will leave home for the first race and will return
at the end of the season. Maybe we will be able to be home for Christmas, but
it depends on the evolution of the pandemic. There will be no spectators during
the races and all the stakeholders, who will have to be present, will have to do
more swabs a week to ensure the safety of us athletes. We ourselves will have
to do weekly controls and limit contacts even with our teammates. On the track,
the two components of a double duo will have to stay away from each other until
the visor will be lowered. The strangest situation will be the journey to
China. We will be taken there on a charter flight. We won't be able to go
anywhere but in the hotel and on the track and we will be completely isolated
all the time."
Surely these are the conditions for an
anomalous season from many points of view, but the safety of the athletes is a
sine qua non for the conduct of all the scheduled competitions and has to be
preserved even with an excess of caution. We will see what will happen, in the
meantime we hope that the return to normality will not come too late to be able
to crowd the tracks all over the world again to cheer, hug and celebrate as we
have always done since the sleds whiz down on the ice.
paola castaldi
