Updated:
—
A season with ups and downs lies behind the Holzkirchen cross-country skier Lucas Bögl. At the end there was another encouragement.
Holzkirchen – It’s been easy training weeks for the German team since the last cross-country World Cup. In Switzerland, the athletes of the German Ski Association (DSV) let the season end and finally took part in the Swiss championships in Sedrun in the canton of Graubünden. Lucas Bögl started in the team sprint – a form of racing that he actually didn’t like that much. Because the Holzkirchner, who starts for the SC Gaißach, is more of an expert in distance races. Out of competition, Bögl and Jonas Dobler took third place. “But that wasn’t worth mentioning,” says Bögl.
On the one hand, because the Swiss cross-country skiers were divided into clubs and therefore did not necessarily go to the cross-country ski run with the best-staffed teams. And on the other hand, because the last weekend of the season was another relaxed get-together for the German team. “We drew a conclusion from the season and thought about how to shape the coming season,” says Bögl.
The past season was marked by mixed results for the 30-year-old. There was the solid start to the special Corona winter 2020/21, followed by the Tour de Ski, which was very successful for Lucas Bögl, in which he finished twelfth in the overall standings. “In most of the races I was able to call up a very high level,” says Bögl. By the end of the Tour de Ski, Bögl also made the World Cup points in all distance races.
Bögl: World Cup not the hoped-for event
Also for the next World Cup after the tour in Lahti, Finland, the Holzkirchner reported fit and showed a good performance in the skiathlon over two 15 kilometers in 24th place. But in Falun (Sweden) he experienced a drop in performance. “I had my kink there”, he sums up and in retrospect suspects that he did too many races and too little training in the weeks after the tour.
Until the season highlight, the world championship in his own country, in Oberstdorf, Bögl did not manage to raise his level of performance. “The World Cup was not what I was hoping for.” That is the sober conclusion. A hoped-for top 15 result did not materialize. Bögl probably showed his best performance in the relay when he finished seventh over the four times ten kilometers. In an individual competition at the world title competitions, place 28 in the freestyle race over 15 kilometers was Bögl’s best result.
Bögl sees eleventh place rather than victory
However, the Holzkirchner celebrated a real sporting highlight in the last World Cup race of the season. He clinched his first World Cup victory in the Swiss high valley of the Engadin – at least that’s how the World Federation FIS sees it. Bögl has a slightly different opinion. In the 50-kilometer pursuit race, the cross-country skiers started with the deficit from the previous day’s race, from which Bögl had taken a substantial mortgage of more than two minutes. In the course of the marathon, Bögl steadily worked his way up and finished eleventh – with the best time of the day, for which the FIS credited him with a World Cup victory. “That was another good performance,” said Bögl happily. “But I see eleventh place in the results list rather than the World Cup victory.”
What the strong race gave him at the end, however, once again: He can keep up with the world’s best. “That gives me courage for the summer and I know what I have to work on.”
–
