Mourning in cottbus – levy: “there were tears in my eyes”

At first glance, everything is as usual. Train riders from 15 nations have come to cottbus to take part in the 28. Rough price of germany the best sprinter and the best sprinter to determine.

The long day of competition begins for keirin world champion fabian zapata from colombia almost exactly at the point on the back straight where double olympic champion kristina vogel fell so badly on tuesday. "We have therefore moved the start a few meters forward this time," says axel viertler from the organizer RSC cottbus.

130 athletes are at the start. Despite the bad news from cottbus, some foreign drivers have even entered the race. Vogel’s teammates from the national team are also almost completely there. Only her long-time team sprint partner miriam welte from kaiserslautern, who together with vogel won olympic gold in the team sprint in 2012 and followed lieb with bronze in 2016, and robert forstemann from berlin canceled at short notice.

Many athletes, coaches and trainers wear neon yellow armbands, t-shirts or caps with the hashtag #staystrongkristina on them. The chemnitz team natural gas.2012, for which vogel has been driving since 2013, has had them made and distributed overnight. Demand is much coarser than supply. A crowd-funding campaign has also been launched under the name of the event.

Four-time world champion maximilian levy, a long-time companion of vogel’s and one of the first to help at the scene of the accident on tuesday, has posted a notice calling for donations of the gross prize money from germany for the campaign. The RSC is digging up just under 4000 euros. "Kristina will need a lot of rehabilitation to return to life. Our goal is to raise 50,000 euros," the letter says.

There is no news about her state of health, but the series winner, who has suffered a serious spinal injury, is likely to undergo further operations. The family controls the flow of information "and of course we act according to that," a spokesman for berlin’s accident hospital marzahn said on friday in response to a query.

When levy talks about the serious accident, his voice falters and his eyes moisten. "When i arrived here today, there were tears in my eyes," said levy, who turned 31 on the day of the accident. A cancellation, however, was not an option. "It’s a piece of processing – forced hermits," said the cottbuser. He runs the 200 meters in 9.700 seconds – track record and personal best at sea level. "It shows what the mind can do. And it was as if kristina had been with me," said levy.

National coach detlef uibel appealed to his fellow coaches in the team managers’ meeting before the race. "We must also see this accident as a wake-up call for us as coaches. I don’t want this to be taken as an accusation, but we have a responsibility to the athletes," said the coach, visibly moved. "We must draw lessons from this for the future."

All entertainment elements were to be dispensed with at the evening event with the final runs. In the past years, a brass band usually tried to create a special atmosphere on the mostly sparsely populated rings. "The mood is just printed, you can feel it everywhere," said viertler.

In 2010, 2013, 2014, 2016 and 2017, vogel won the traditional sprint competition on the 333-meter concrete track. At the dress rehearsal a week ago, the 27-year-old again stood at the top of the podium in the same place, laughing. This time her name will be missing from the list of winners.