Franziska Preuß classifies the importance of her overall World Cup victory. The biathlete surprises with her statements about the Olympics – an expert is partly against it.
An Olympic victory is still missing in the vita of the freshly baked overall World Cup winner Franziska Preuss. Is that the big dream of the biathlete who she is watching in Milan and Cortina d’Ampezzo with a view to the 2026 winter games in 2026?
“The big ball was the biggest dream for me that I could fulfill myself,” said Preuss in Spotlight Spotlight in the Spotlight.
Franziska Preuß commented on the 2026 winter Olympics in 2026
Preuss: Olympics would be “encore to the whole”
Olympia has a lower status for the 31-year-old compared to the overall World Cup: “The Olympic medals may be a bit about it for outsiders in a ranking. There is simply this hype with the Olympics. I think there is nothing bigger than this big ball from athletic perspective.”
In 2022, Preuss won an Olympic bronze medal as a relay runner with the DSV team. In addition to the Olympic victory, she also lacks a single medal at the winter games.
Of course, Preuss will pursue the goal of winning an Olympic individual medal in the coming year: “But that would definitely be an encore again to the whole, because the big ball means me a lot.”
Rösch, on the other hand, holds: “Olympic victory is higher quality”
Ex-biathlete Michael Rösch, who became Olympic champion with the German Season Olympic champion in 2006, weighted the competitions a little differently than Prussia. “For me, the Olympic victory is higher, but knowing that I have always been realistic and said: ‘I can never win the overall World Cup anyway,’ said the 41-year-old in Spotlight.
However, Rösch Preuss’ argument was also able to understand: “I agree with Franzi’s right, an Olympic victory is a little more on the media. I am still announced as an Olympic champion years later and that remains.”
At the Olympics, there was also more chances of winning because it only decides a race about the medals, Rösch noted.
“There are always ups and downs”
In the overall World Cup, on the other hand, it is not only the performance that needs to be brought: “The truth also includes that the best comes through the end of November to the end of March. There are always ups and downs.”
That is why Rösch is right in this regard: “From a sports point of view, an overall World Cup is already the big cutlery.”