Ski racer Maximilian Schwarz (18) is happy: He can compete in the European Cup.
At the DM, the Hohenpeißenberger has proven that he is fast - he has won three medals in his class.
Hohenpeißenberg - A winter in a skier's life is like a book.
It tells many stories, of successes and failures, of trips to distant countries, of companions, of friends.
And if it's a good book, the cover picture is enough to guess what happened.
On the front page of Maximilian Schwarz's yearbook one would probably see Fritz Dopfer.
The meeting with him was only a small episode in the corona winter, but a formative one.
It went something like this: Fritz Dopfer, at least once vice world champion in slalom and now a member of the Garmisch-Partenkirchen World Cup organizing committee, saw the Hohenpeissenberger tame the Kandahar.
Then he said words that seem like doping.
He attested that Black had a good foundation and a lot of potential, with which it could go forward and up in the best case.
"It's a relief when you hear something like that from an ex-World Cup driver," said the 18-year-old.
Twice silver and one bronze in the U21 class
Maximilian Schwarz's season is not over yet, one chapter is still free.
He will finish it this weekend at Oberjoch when he will compete twice in slalom in the European Cup.
For someone who has spent the entire winter in league three, at the FIS races, it's a bit like being promoted from second to first team to try to get a picture from football.
In his case, it is "confirmation rather than reward".
His trainers have long been planning to send him into the toughest arena in skiing.
The time is right.
Maximilian Schwarz won three medals at the junior championships, class U21.
These competitions don't run like a world championship, they are distributed across the south of the country.
Silver in the descent on the Kandahar, Garmisch-Partenkirchen.
Bronze in the giant slalom on Götschen, silver in the slalom on Oberjoch - that's the balance sheet.
He considers this last medal to be particularly valuable.
“I like that best,” says Schwarz.
And you can interpret this mix of joy and relief in two ways.
Once he worked a lot on his movements in the technical disciplines.
He speaks of technical things that have to mature with a lot of repetition.
In the past four months he has made it into the top 500 in the world in slalom and giant slalom.
That's a decent balance sheet at a time when the rest of Germany was locked away, albeit with a not exactly unbreakable lock.
A second reference is also allowed to the circumstances on the Oberjoch: The Hohenpeißenberger had to start far back, on a bad slope.
He just reached the second run.
But then things really went off.
Third best time of all runners (there were also older ones).
“Overall the greatest achievement,” says Maximilian Schwarz.
He also knows what to expect on Saturday and Sunday tomorrow.
The European Cup can be the ice hell on earth for beginners.
They wear start numbers around 90, slide down battered ice channels, somehow want to make it into the top 60 in the second run.
“You start from scratch,” says Maximilian Schwarz.
You've heard of the softened slopes on the Oberjoch.
The organizers will treat them with salt, which makes the snow marsh hard.
Schwarz hopes that the track doesn't get irregular, that you can see where the track is.
Otherwise it could be an uncomfortable shaking ride.
He doesn't set a goal.
Give the best, more is not possible.
The big exams of the year only start after that anyway.
The Abitur is due in spring.
At the moment he is looking to “reduce skiing to a minimum”.
But then things really start: the long journey to the World Cup.