Tensions with sports director Felix Bitterling have apparently led to the resignation of head coach Uros Velepec. Horn sees “big problems”.
Biathlete Philipp Horn sees “tensions between the coach and the sporting management” as the reason for the surprising resignation of Uros Velepec. “There were simply differences that both sides could not clarify. We also thought that it could be that he says after the season: that was his last. But I would never have thought that it would happen this season, ”said Horn in an interview with Munich Merkur/Tz .
Men’s national coach Velepec and the German Ski Association (DSV) had separated with immediate effect after the World Cup in Lenzerheide. As the successor, Tobias Reiter, who was responsible for the first time at the World Cup in Nove Mesto (Thursday to Sunday).
Germany far away from the top nations
Sports director Felix Bitterling was someone, explained Horn, “who definitely thinks about the next few years, which is absolutely right, and I didn’t have the feeling that we were on the right track in terms of training. He is looking for approaches how to improve the whole thing. And I would say that his ideas were not compatible with the training philosophy, of which Uros is convinced. These are both strong personalities with their own views in this case. “
Horn currently sees the German men far away from the top compared to the top nations. “Unfortunately, you have to say that the big teams – France, Norway – are just better, and everything has to go absolutely perfect for us, that we can keep against it and that they can beat them on a good day,” he said. At the World Cup, there were only bronze for the men’s relay.
Horn also identified a “big problem” in the men’s area in the offspring. “The next generation still has a very good distance forward. And I don’t have the feeling that she got a lot closer compared to last season, ”he said. He hoped that “a leap out, otherwise it will be dark after the Olympics”.