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Gymnasts Pauline (left) and Helene Schäfer: Physical and psychological torments
Photo: Sonja Och
"A big chapter in her life"
A few hours after her
text about the mental abuse of gymnasts was
published, editor Antje Windmann received a special email.
At 5:14 a.m.
It was like an international domino effect: after the abuse scandal in American gymnastics became known four years ago, athletes from other nations had also revealed that they had been physically and mentally tortured for years.
At the end of November, several German gymnasts went public for the first time, reported in SPIEGEL how their trainer Gabriele Frehse had apparently been mentally abused for years by their coach Gabriele Frehse at the federal base in Chemnitz, which she denies.
The research triggered a multitude of reactions.
Public, but also hidden.
These included personal letters to SPIEGEL from women who had experienced something similar in gymnastics and who have not been able to complete it to this day.
Among the reactions was news from a father.
It reached SPIEGEL just a few hours after the article appeared, at 5:14 a.m.
The sender was a man named Heinz Krümmer.
His daughter had also exercised for a long time in Chemnitz under Frehse.
From his lines it is clear that he sat at the mail all night.
He strings together painful memories.
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