ÖOC President Karl Stoss expressed the hope on Monday that he would again “go home richly laden” and gave a target of the hoped-for medals. “I would put the bar somewhere between Pyeongchang (14 medals) and Sochi (17),” said Stoss. “If we end up somewhere in the middle, it’s a huge achievement.” In addition, as in the past games, they want to be among the ten best winter sports nations.
Ski star Matthias Mayer, snowboarders Anna Gasser and Julia Dujmovits and tobogganist David Gleirscher are also back after winning the title and are among the favorites again. On Wednesday, the ÖOC delegation will be officially farewelled by Federal President Alexander Van der Bellen in the Vienna Hofburg. The first charter plane with participants in the first week of the Olympics will take off for Beijing this Friday.
Among those who were not nominated are well-known names such as Chiara Mair, Max Franz, Stefan Brennsteiner and Fabio Gstrein (alpine skiing), Julian Eberhard (biathlon), Chiara Kreuzer and Philipp Aschenwald (ski jumping) and Lukas Klapfer (Nordic combined). Due to injuries, Adrian Pertl and Roland Leitinger, among others, were not an issue for the Alpine athletes, for Nicole Schmidhofer and Nina Ortlieb the Olympics came too early after their injuries. Snowboarder Claudia Riegler is not vaccinated against the corona virus and was therefore not nominated.
ÖOC General Secretary Peter Mennel promised an increase in the number if the currently hotly debated alpine ski quota for Austria’s men changes to 11 (instead of the current 9). “We still have hope in this regard. But the entry deadline is here, we have nominated nine gentlemen.” The ÖSV and other nations are waiting for the IOC to agree to the proposal to transfer unused quota places from other sports to Alpine, or for the World Ski Federation (FIS) to cancel questionable races that caused a quota shift.
With the exception of ice hockey, curling and short track, Austria is represented in all 15 sports of the 7 sports associations. Tyrol (30) again makes up the majority of the red-white-red participants, followed by Salzburg (20), Carinthia, Vorarlberg (12 each), Styria (11), Lower Austria (10), Upper Austria (8) and Burgenland (1) . If you look at the club affiliation, then only the federal capital Vienna is not represented.
Salzburg provides the oldest and youngest participants: Alpine snowboarder Andreas Prommegger is contesting his fifth Winter Games at the age of 41 (born in 1980), ski freestyler Matej Svancer (2004) is 17 years old and has his Olympic baptism of fire.
A couple – a man and a woman – will carry the red-white-red flag at the opening ceremony on February 4 at Beijing’s “Bird’s Nest” stadium. Who is open and will be determined by February 2nd.
The pandemic has the mega event firmly in its grip. All people involved in the Olympics enter a bubble when entering China and are only allowed to move within it. PCR tests take place daily, and those who test positive are transferred to a quarantine hotel or to a hospital if the course is symptomatic. In terms of Covid countermeasures, the required Ct value was reduced from 40 to 35. “It shows that the IOC negotiated very well with the Chinese authorities,” Mennel said.
The games are not unproblematic from another point of view either, numerous countries are reacting to China’s human rights violations with political boycotts. Austria’s athletes do not have to hold back in their assessments, the ÖOC said on Monday. “Everyone is allowed freedom of expression and if he or she has something to say, then they are very welcome to do so,” Stoss explained, while Mennel tersely said: “We don’t have a gag order.”
Beijing will be the first city ever to host both summer and winter games. The Summer Games took place there in 2008, some of the venues being reused – the Games would thus also do justice to aspects of sustainability, according to the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
In the Chinese capital, where all sports take place on smooth ice, four of the six competition venues have been spared the construction of new ones. However, two-thirds of the major event is outsourced from Beijing, in Yanqing the competitions for alpine skiers and in the ice channel take place, in Zhangjiakou the Nordic disciplines, biathlon and snowboarding. Olympic Villages have been established in all three areas. Some of the Austrian athletes will also live outside.
The entire ÖOC delegation consists of 340 people. Christoph Sieber, who is responsible for sports at the ÖOC and windsurfing Olympic champion in 2000 in Sydney, acts as Chef de Mission. According to the ÖOC, the total costs amount to around 5.5 million euros “due to pandemic-related travel restrictions and cost explosion”. The costs for Pyeongchang 2018 were 4.5 million. As in Tokyo 2021, there will be no “Austria House” as a meeting point for guests from sports, business, tourism, politics and the media. Instead, a digital Austria House is offered under.