At Halloween 2014, the then 13 -year -old Caroline Bredlinger was injured by a rifle shot. The Austrian 800-meter runner is still in pain today. However, she does not stop this from sporting success. In Tokyo, the 24-year-old takes part in a World Athletics Championship for the first time.
On October 31, 2014, she said it herself – from one moment to the other moment, the childhood of Caroline Bredlinger: The young person was traveling with friends in the village of Großhöflein in Burgenland when she suddenly felt stinging pain in the buttocks and in the left leg.
What had happened later turned out to be in the hospital and the investigation by the police: A drunk man had indiscriminately shot around the area from a nearby balcony with a rifle and met her.
The projectile fragmented on her pelvic bone, since then 24 small metal parts have been encapsulated in her body. Almost eleven years later, she still feels pain, for example cannot sit long, her left leg is also weaker than the right.
Running is the most important thing in Bredlinger’s life
It is not surprising that the talented runner did not end with sport after her firing injury. At the time, she was very afraid of never being able to walk again. Because running was and has been her life since Bredlinger’s childhood.
“I had too much energy as a child. My mother then gave me the choice: gymnastics or athletics? So I got athletics. And while running I had the most talent”she told shortly before departure to the World Cup At the Austrian courier TV.
“I am in the form of my life”
There were extremely heavy phases in her youth, she cried often. “And there were many moments when I could have stopped.”
The fact that this Thursday (12:58 p.m., in the live ticker at Sportschau.de) at the World Cup in Tokyo in their 800-meter lead with the world year’s best Keely Hogkinson from Great Britain and other top runners is still surreal for this reason: “The World Cup participation means a lot to me. A childhood dream comes true. I always wanted to. I still can’t believe it.”
Her goal is the qualification for the semi -finals, but in her run she has to get under the first three if possible. “I am in the form of my life, I worked on that for years. A personal best would be a dream”said Bredlinger. In sight, she also wants to attack Stephanie Graf’s Austrian state record (1: 56.64), which has existed in Sydney since the Olympic Games in 2000. “It’s not impossible.”
For the first time in her career under two minutes
The World Cup participation perfectly made Bredlinger in the Slovenian Maribor at the end of June when she won the 800 meters at the team of the team in personal best time of 1: 58.95 minutes. “I fell an insane load from the heart.” Shortly before, she had stayed under two minutes in Vienna for the first time in her career. At the end of July, she won at ISTAF in Berlin 1: 58.99 minutes. The Austrian already made the qualification for the European Championship perfect in Birmingham next year.
Sorry for the perpetrator, she does not accept it
As a teenager and young adults, she had often doubted herself. Immediately after her firing injury, the young athlete had not helped mental help.
It was not easy to be interviewed by the police and later sit towards the perpetrator in the courtroom. He was sentenced to a prison for serious bodily harm.
“He wanted to shake my hand, I rejected it. The perpetrator’s apology does not help me. She doesn’t change the fact that my life has changed. Nobody can tell me whether I will ever get rid of the pain”said the 24-year-old to the “standard”.
With her victory at the ISTAF in Berlin, Caroline Bredlinger qualified for the EM 2026.
Bredlinger doesn’t look back
Until she was 20 years old, the athlete fought in vain to find the connection and to reach her old level of performance again. Then she took a six -month break from competitive sports, and in 2020 a new attempt finally followed.
It has recently become significantly stronger in the psychological and physical area. “We always looked like it as good as possible, but also to train as gently as possible.” Not only physiotherapy and the targeted training with her mother Ursula brought her ahead, but also helped talks with a sports psychologist. “When I was going uphill again, I felt better again mentally.”
Bredlinger is often asked about the gunshot wound from 2014, but she actually doesn’t want to look back at all: “Could I run faster today if I didn’t have the pain? I don’t know, I lack the comparison. I only know it. I don’t want to measure everything in my life from the fact that I have been shot. I am proud of what I have achieved.”