Transforming against each other into togetherness – decathlete Niklas Kaul from USC Mainz has proven that this is also possible in competitive sports and has been awarded for it.
Mainz’s Niklas Kaul was honored with the Fair Play Prize of German Sports on Thursday evening together with Simon Ehammer (Switzerland), who finished second at the European Championships, in Wiesbaden’s Biebrich Palace. The two decathletes received the award for the “way of turning competitions against each other into togetherness”.
“You have taken the team spirit to the next level. You embody fair play, ambition, competition, respect and friendship,” said Thomas Weikert, President of the German Olympic Sports Confederation (DOSB), in his laudation for the award winners. “You are quite the best competitors.”
Most recently, the two track and field athletes proved this at the European Championships last year in Munich, where the 25-year-old Kaul won the title and Ehammer took silver. “I am very happy about the award, but I was also surprised about it,” said Kaul. “It’s a special relationship with Simon, but it’s often the case in the all-around that you get along very well, so it’s a prize for the whole decathlon.”
Season starts for Kaul in Ratingen
Kaul wants to complete his first decathlon this year on June 17th and 18th in Ratingen. He said at a digital press conference on Thursday that he would not use the first opportunity to start in Götzis, Austria, at the end of May “99 percent”. As a reason for his later all-around entry, he said that he still needed time to build up his form in order to be able to surpass the Olympic standard of 8,460 points for the 2024 Games in Paris in Ratingen.
However, there will no longer be a special training camp before the event for the Mainz student: “I’m preparing for Ratingen at home, also because I simply have to go to university.” The 2019 World Champion has already secured his ticket for the World Championships from August 19th to 27th in Budapest via the world rankings.
