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Walker Christopher Linke in Sapporo: In the end, only 22 seconds were missing from a medal rank
Photo:
Clive Brunskill / Getty Images
Sapporo.
That sounds like cold, even like snow and ice, after all, the 1972 Winter Olympics were held in the city on the Japanese island of Hokkaido.
The games in which Erhard Keller and Monika Pflug became stars, Ulrich Wehling and Bernhard Russi.
The organizers of the Tokyo Summer Games this year must have had that in the back of their minds when they put the walking competitions in the city 800 kilometers away from Tokyo in advance to avoid the heat of the capital and to spare the athletes from extreme temperatures.
Alone: The plan did not work out.
In Sapporo it is currently as hot as it has not been in decades, and so the walkers had to master their 20 kilometers on Thursday at around 30 degrees, and shortly after the start there were the first muscle cramps in the field.
And those who approached the race too quickly like the Chinese Zhen Wang, who was one of the top favorites and led the rankings for a long time, had to pay tribute to the conditions in the end.
Christopher Linke did it differently.
And so in the end the best German in his field was able to keep improving.
It wasn't quite enough for the medals in the end, but fifth place is the next top position for the left at major events.
In Rio five years ago he was already fifth, at the World Cup in Doha 2019, when the heat absurdly even had to start at night, fourth.
Left was always strong when others ran out of breath in the weather conditions.
The fact that such achievements do not appear in any medal table is one of the unalterable annoyances of top-class sport.
"I'm obviously the heat type"
"I'm obviously a hot guy," said the 32-year-old then, barely five minutes after the race, already breathing again in the ZDF interview.
Halfway through the competition, Linke, trained by walking legend Ronald Weigel for years, was just among the top 30. After that, he began to bite.
Left caught up place by place.
While the Italian Massimo Stano made the strongest final sprint at the very front and the two highly rated Japanese Koki Ikeda and Toshikazu Yamanishi distanced, the German was only 22 seconds short of a medal rank.
His mental coach Maco Gerloff had previously advised him: "When things get really tough, start talking to yourself", and that's what he did, motivating himself again and again with "Come on, boy, do it".
Linke and Co. finally had to get the cheers themselves, the audience on the track was not allowed due to the corona.
Actually not approved, you have to add.
Walking is so popular in Japan that spectators actually dared to take the route and created a little bit of Olympic atmosphere in Sapporo.
Linke had missed them the day before.
He had not seen a single Olympic flag or the rings here, he had scolded the day before the competition, "They were hoping to go to the Olympics and not the World Cup." He didn’t even think about the Olympic village in the capital , then "I just get jealous".
At least the atmosphere in Sapporo was cool, if it wasn't the temperatures.
In Potsdam in the heat chamber
Linke was prepared for the heat, so the 30 degrees actually came towards him.
At home in Potsdam he had repeatedly climbed into a heat chamber, 38 degrees, with a humidity of up to 80 percent - and exercising on the treadmill or bicycle at the same time, that made him fit for the conditions in Japan.
At the same time, the hat wearer Linke had his sister sewn caps in which he could carry ice packs for his neck and head.
It all seems to have paid off, one had the impression: If the race had lasted a few kilometers longer, this time it would have worked out with the medal dream.
In fact, left colleagues have a few more kilometers to complete on Friday in the 50-kilometer walk, starting early in the morning at half past five.
It is the supreme discipline of walkers - and at the same time a farewell to the Olympics.
The distance is to be walked for the last time, the International Olympic Committee (IOC) is instead considering a mixed competition or a shortening to 35 kilometers for the next games.
From the point of view of the left, who can watch the competition in peace, this is a clearly wrong decision. »The traditional route is 50 kilometers away. 35 kilometers is a meaningless distance for me, «he says. It's probably just too short for him. The competition in Tokyo finally showed it: When others are longing for the goal, Christopher Linke really gets going.
