Kristina Vogel drove her run-out lap with hanging shoulders, for the first time in Apeldoorn there was nothing to celebrate. The track cycling Olympic champion from Erfurt missed her third gold medal at the World Championships and her twelfth overall. But Vogel had already achieved her personal goal in the Netherlands before.
The 27-year-old wanted to win “three medals”,”maybe one of them gold”. After sixth place in the Keirin race on Sunday it was “only” two medals, but with the victories in the team sprint and sprint two of the highest category. In addition, with a total of eleven world championship titles, she came out on top of Australia’s Anna Meares in the “eternal” leaderboard.
Despite the rest day before Vogel seemed to miss the last punch in the Keirin-final. After the superior victories in the first two laps, she didn’t make it to the front in the decisive race:”Everyone wants to see me fall. It becomes more and more difficult from one competition to the next,”she said:”Art is to remain unpredictable at all times,” and she was unable to do so on Sunday.
But this year’s World Championships could have been as dominant as in 2014 in Cali, Colombia, when Vogel and her team sprint partner Miriam Welte (Kaiserslautern) won all four short time races.”Kristina raised it after the team sprint,”said Welte on Sunday:”It’s the kind of thing as in Cali, that would be awesome. And when she really became sprint world champion on Friday, I just thought,”Shit, now you’re under pressure, now you have to win the 500.”
No sooner said than done. Welte delivered and won the 500 m time trial on Saturday. Only Vogel was denied the last coup. Nevertheless, short-term national coach Detlef Uibel drew a positive conclusion:”We have three women who are world leaders,” because in addition to Vogel and Welte, Uibel has another ace on the track: Pauline Grabosch.
Vogel’s only 20 year old team mate from Erfurt, Germany, competed with Welte in the qualification in the team sprint on Wednesday and secured her first World Cup gold medal. In Vogel’s sprint victory she also won her first individual medal with bronze.
“Pauline has made a very, very big development in a relatively short time. She is certainly one of the greatest prospects for the Olympic Games in Tokyo,”Uibel said to his protégé:” But she needs to be tough enough to compete, because her greatest potential lies there.
But there are still two and a half years to Tokyo. Enough time for Grabosch to develop himself further. For birds and worlds, the challenge remains to consolidate their exceptional position in the world.
Federal coach Uibel, on the other hand, takes a “critical”view of the men’s situation. Even though there are understandable reasons for the results, only Maximilian Levy from Cottbus with Keirin-Bronze and fourth place in the sprint remained a ray of hope,”We have to question that,”said Uibel. But here too, however, two and a half years remain to get all men fit and in shape for “the big highlight”.