Starnberger wants to be European champion in Munich: Power volleyball for the podium

Created: 08/16/2022, 2:35 p.m

By: Patrick Reichelt

Ready to take off: Clemens Wickler from Starnberg.

© dpa/Schwartz

Clemens Wickler from Starnberg and his partner are in shape just in time for the European Championships.

Will the gold medal win at the end?

Munich – Sometimes it doesn't take too much to get back on track.

A special place is enough.

In Hamburg, Clemens Wickler made it to Vice World Champion in 2019.

And now Germany's best beach volleyball player has found his smile again here.

For four days, the Starnberger and his new partner Nils Ehlers floated through the Elite 16 tournament in the Hanseatic city as if on a cloud.

Had achieved the greatest achievement of the still young partnership with bronze.

And with it the realization that it can come, the second big highlight of the season.

Today, Wickler and Ehlers are entering the European Championships on Munich's Königsplatz against the Danish Kristoffers Abell and Brinck.

This will be a special moment, especially for winders.

He has never auditioned as a professional in his old home country.

When beach volleyball was last tried in the state capital in the form of the Smart Beach Tour, "I was just 16 and still too young".

Now he is celebrating the premiere as probably the greatest hope alongside the women's duo Karla Borger/Julia Sude, who are in top form.

Accompanied by the euphoria and anticipation of friends and acquaintances, for whom he got tickets for the finals from Friday.

"Let's hope," he said, "that we'll still be there." It went wrong once this season - only 17th place at the World Championships in Rome.

"A damper," as Wickler thought.

But a well calculated one.

The 27-year-old defensive ace has teamed up with the 2.1m giant Ehlers to make a splash at the 2024 Olympics in Paris.

And the coaches Jürgen Wagner and Thomas Kaczmarek have geared their work towards this goal.

The clean rehearsal of processes is more important than the fast medal.

"Sometimes it takes getting used to," said Wickler.

But a look at Wagner's CV, which includes two Olympic champions in Brink/Reckermann (2012) and Ludwig/Walkenhorst (2016), makes patience easier.

Unlike Wickler's filigree ex-partner Julius Thole, the motto with Ehlers is "power volleyball".

Pressure and force with serve and attack - Wickler and Ehlers proved that this could work, despite sometimes difficult preparation, in the early phase of the season.

In the first tournaments, they reliably made it into the top 5.

“We were actually ahead of schedule there,” Wickler found.

After the World Cup setback, the two German hopefuls took a break.

The tournament in Gstaad was skipped, as was the Nations Cup in Vienna.

In Hamburg, at the flagship tournament of the German Volleyball Association, the two presented themselves all the better recovered.

Right up to the small final, in which the Dutchmen Boermans/Immers were defeated 2-0.

The duo will see each other again in the preliminary round in Munich.