There could actually be a happy ending for Axel Jungk from the Ore Mountains. In 2020 he finished second at the World Championships in skeleton, then injured himself and missed the following World Cup season. This winter he’s fighting his way back up and takes second place in the overall World Cup. His goal: a medal at the Olympic Winter Games in Beijing. And then – two weeks before it starts – Corona.
“I had nothing to blame myself for”
“The worst thought after the infection was that I was completely innocent. I had nothing to blame myself for, I wasn’t in a bar after the last World Cup, I lived like a monk for half a year. Totally against my nature, no party, nothing. And then the Olympics are suddenly very far away”Jungk describes the time after the test result.
A time of uncertainty for him, who finished seventh at the Pyeongchang Games four years ago and now, at almost 31, may have his last big shot at a medal. He has since tested negative four times. Just in time. He has just completed the entry formalities to get the so-called Green Health Code. The Chinese organizers won’t let anyone in at the Olympics without it.
“Endorphins like never before”
Jungk has it and is sitting happily on the plane to Beijing this Tuesday at 5:20 p.m.: “After the crucial third negative result, I had more endorphins than ever before. No World Cup victory can match that.”
He will only miss the first two training runs. And he continued to work on his athletics, at home in Dresden. “Physically I’m fine. I don’t think I’ll have a big disadvantage. It’s the Olympics, I’m on fire every day and nothing changes in my dream of a medal.”the former ski jumper is confident about the next two weeks.
National coach still worried
If Axel Jungk arrives safely, national coach Christian Baude will have his six-strong team complete. Hannah Neise, like Jungk, tested positive for Covid 19 after the last World Cup in St Moritz, but recovered earlier and arrived regularly.
However, Baude is very afraid that something could still happen: “Every day we see the ambulance picking up people in the Olympic Village. You just can’t protect yourself completely.”. That is why the national coach would have advocated postponing the event in China.
Who knows who else is out”
“These will simply not be sportingly fair competitions. The two Russians Tregubov and Semenov, after all fourth and fifth in the World Cup, will definitely not be there. Who knows who else will be out.”, says Christian Baude. He would like to bring home a medal for women and men.
The long track in Beijing suits the female department in the German team, which has recently been weakening, especially at the start. And with the men, Axel Jungk could certainly crown his exciting story.