Gina Lückenkemper has been training with star coach Lance Brauman in Florida since 2020. The cooperation is fruitful. After the European Championship gold, she now wants to go to the World Cup final. But she is sometimes “crying on the train” or “knocked out” on the couch.
Gina Lückenkemper is generally a positive, happy person. But when the sprinter got on the plane to Florence on Wednesday, she was in a particularly good mood.
“Now the fun part of the year begins”, said Lückenkemper in an interview with the sports show. On Friday evening, the 26-year-old will start over 100 meters at the Diamond League meeting in the Italian metropolis.
It’s her start to the European outdoor season – and it’s also her first appearance at an event in the Diamond League series in many years. “I want to get a technically clean race on the track. Because in the past few weeks I’ve noticed that if I run technically clean, the races will be incredibly fast.”said Lückenkemper, who proudly added that she “More fit than ever at the moment”..
At the beginning of May, Lückenkemper already ran 11.00 seconds
Her results so far confirm that. In Atlanta, the European champion sprinted across the finish line on May 6th after 11.00 seconds, on May 21st on the Bermuda Islands, Lückenkemper was stopped with a time of 11.03 seconds. “And all out of training”, she points out. For comparison: Your fastest times last year were 10.99 seconds at the German championships and in the European Championship final in Munich.
The reason for the early form lies in Clermont, a small town in Central Florida, about 35 kilometers west of Orlando. That’s where it is National Training Center by Lance Brauman. The American is considered a top trainer in the sprint area – and thus a magnet for international stars. His training group includes world champions such as Noah Lyles (USA/200 meters), Olympic champion Shaunea Miller-Uibo (Bahamas/400 meters) and world record holder Wayde van Niekerk (South Africa/400 meters).
Last year “reached another level”
Gina Lückenkemper has also been training at Brauman since 2020. You got yourself first “have to get used to each other”but so be it “completely normal”, says the 53-year-old to the sports show. It took some time until Lückenkemper’s body had adapted to the tough units and was no longer on strike – and the German was able to train without injury.
Brauman speaks of a “learning curve” and confirms Lückenkemper last year “reached another level”and “Coped with our training much better” to have.
The result was the most successful season in Lückenkemper’s career. When she talks about 2022, it’s easy to see her mentally going over “the many highlights.” And “every single one of these many small highlights”emphasizes Lückenkemper, is for her “important and special” been. For example, the German championship title in the Berlin Olympic Stadium in 10.99 seconds. For the first time in four years, it stayed below the eleven-second mark.
Lückenkemper won EM gold and became “Sportswoman of the Year”
Then the World Cup in Eugene. First the frustration after the semifinals over the 100 meters, “because I couldn’t access my potential there.” But then followed a few days later “this amazing relay success.” Lückenkemper sprinted together with Tatjana Pinto, Alexandra Burghardt and Rebekka Haase to bronze in the 4×100 meters.
At the subsequent European Championships in Munich, she “enjoyed every single second unbelievably”. Lückenkemper won gold in the 100 meters and in the relay. And in December she was voted “Sportswoman of the Year”. “For me it’s just an incredibly big recognition.”
“The European Champ is here!”
All the medals and merits not only made headlines in Germany, but also increased their standing and status in Florida. When Lückenkemper came back to Clermont for the first time after her successes in the fall, her training colleagues greeted her with: “The European Champ is here!” And when Wayde van Niekerk finished ahead of the German in the coordination exercises over 20 meters at the start of the units, the South African regularly shouted: “I beat the European Champ!” (I defeated the European Champion).
At the beginning of March, Lückenkemper flew back to Florida. Brauman had announced the training group “take your legs off”– and kept my word. Lückenkemper reports from “one day or another” at which they return home after training “first knocked out for an hour on the couch” have lain and “completely gone” has been. It wasn’t until mid-May, she says, that the units became a little less tough.
Coach Brauman thinks a German record is possible
Brauman calls Lückenkemper one “Yes sir. No sir”-Athlete, the “always learning” wool. “It doesn’t get any better”, according to the American. Lückenkemper wants to “constantly run under eleven seconds” in the future.
Brauman even credits his athlete with times that were utopian for German women for a long time. “I think she can run under 10.90 seconds”, says the coach. He even thinks Marlies Göhr’s German record of 10.81 seconds is possible. “But let’s target 10.90 seconds first – and then we’ll see.”
Brauman speaks of “a process” and from having such goals “in small steps” need to be addressed. The common goal is the Summer Games in Paris next year. On the way there, this year’s World Championships in Budapest is an important intermediate stage. “That’s what I worked my ass off for in Florida – and once or twice cried on the tartan track.”Lückenkemper emphasizes bluntly.
Open account with the World Cup
She’s extra motivated, got with the World Cup “still an open account.” Because she wants “not content with not making it to a World Cup singles final”, says Lückenkemper, who missed the final in Eugene last summer by 12 hundredths. The times, she emphasizes, are indeed “became blatant – but so am I.”