There are many film adaptations about the life of great athletes or weird birds in sport: Bubi Scholz, Muhammad Ali, Niki Lauda, Björn Borg/John McEnroe, Bert Trautmann or Eddie “The Eagle” – their stories have already been told on the screen, just to name a few to name a few.
Of course, there has never been a plot like the career of Norwegian ski jumper Daniel Andre Tande. Norway’s sporting director Clas Brede Braathen is certainly right when he says: “You can’t even make a movie out of it, that would be too stupid, too beautiful.”
A victory that brings tears
On Sunday (March 6th, 2022) Tande, 28-year-old ski jumper from Narvik, won his eighth World Cup competition. A victory nobody thought possible. When his triumph on the legendary ski jumping facility at Holmenkollen in Oslo was certain, he laid his head on mother Trude’s left shoulder – and cried. He wasn’t the only one that afternoon.
Almost a year earlier, Tande was at the ski flyingWM crashed so badly in Planica that he was already on the verge of death, now he achieved the eighth World Cup victory of his career. And that at home in Oslo.
“This is sick, completely sick”
“It’s sick, completely sick, it doesn’t make any sense”, said Tande, trying impossible to put into words his emotions at this moving moment. The fact that he had already finished second in Klingenthal almost three months earlier “sick enough already” been, but now “Winning at home at the Kollen – it doesn’t get any better”.
Unsurprisingly, his voice cracked as he said all of this. After his horror fall on March 25, 2021, Tande had to be treated in an emergency, he reported in June “Had no pulse for two and a half to three minutes“. He had to be intubated and mechanically ventilated and was in an artificial coma for days.
Stöckl: “Great moment for the ski jumping family”
When the worst was behind him, it was clear to Tande: he wanted to go back – just to start with “to enjoy ski jumping”. Last but not least, he surprised himself at Holmenkollen. “I don’t think anyone expected that, including myself”, he assured. Alexander Stöckl, Norway’s head coach, spoke of one of the “great moments of the ski jumping family”.
So now Tande travels on to Vikersund as a winner. The Ski Flying World Championships start there on Thursday (until Sunday), on a hill that they “Monster Bakken” to name. Will Tande jump? “I can promise”he said, “I’ll definitely try.”
Source: wp/sid