Olympia 2022: Andreas Wellinger tested positive for Corona – defending champion threatens to end Beijing

“What can I say? The knee is better again, I had medical clearance and could jump. And then the shitty corona test comes up,” said Wellinger, who after having recovered from problems with the operated knee on Saturday for one of the remaining Olympic starting places wanted to fight: “Unfortunately I can’t do that now, and that’s bitter. I’m in good health, I don’t notice anything, but the CT value was just beyond the limit.”

Wellinger, who was absent in Zakopane last time, should have started qualifying on Friday. After the competition on Saturday (4:15 p.m. live on Eurosport), national coach Stefan Horngacher wants to award his last two Beijing places. Wellinger, Severin Freund, Pius Paschke and Constantin Schmid were all possible. Karl Geiger, Markus Eisenbichler and Stephan Leyhe are already seeded.

“It’s very bitter with Andi, we would have needed him very well here. But the situation is difficult worldwide,” said Horngacher on “ARD”. Regarding the impact on the Olympic nomination, he said: “I don’t want to talk about Beijing just yet.”

The best of a strong German team in qualifying was ski flying world champion Geiger (Oberstdorf) with a jump of 136.0 m behind Slovenian Cene Prevc and World Cup leader Ryoyu Kobayashi from Japan. Eisenbichler (Siegsdorf) came eighth, team world champion Freund (Rastbüchl/9th), Schmid (Oberaudorf/10th), Paschke (Kiefersfelden/15th) and Leyhe (26th) safely qualified for the competition of the top 50.

Friday for the first time in over a year

The three-time world champion Richard Freitag (Aue) also made it into the competition field as 35th, who will be making his first World Cup appearance since January 1, 2021 on Saturday. The sluggish veteran, recently only at the start in the third-rate FIS Cup, had slipped into the squad for Titisee-Neustadt via the so-called national group.

Justin Lisso (Schmiedefeld), Philipp Raimund (Oberstdorf) and Martin Hamann (Aue) also made it into the competition from the “B squad”. Only former junior world champion David Siegel (Baiersbronn), who is not recovering after a serious knee injury in early 2019, dropped out.

Like the other host nations, the DSV may bring an additional contingent of up to six jumpers to the start for two home World Cup competitions per season. Unlike in previous years, the association used this only once at the Four Hills Tournament in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and decided on Titisee-Neustadt as the second date.

(SID)