“Bottom drawer”
Angry national coach attacks rowing world champion
09/29/2022, 2:59 p.m
In the German Rowing Association, the world has not been in order for a long time. The last remaining star of the association, one world champion Oliver Zeidler, launched an all-out attack around the European Championships at home. National coach Brigitte Bielig is outraged and resigns angrily.
Rowing national coach Brigitte Bielig has sharply criticized one world champion Oliver Zeidler because of his all-round attack against the association. She “actually also had individual discussions”, but she “never heard anything from him about structural problems or personnel consequences”, Bielig told the “Sächsische Zeitung”: “I have to say, that was the bottom drawer.”
Zeidler had publicly massively criticized the German Rowing Association (DRV) for the disappointing European Championships at home and emphasized in an interview before the World Cup last week that he had “already addressed his criticism internally several times”.
At the World Championships in Racice/Czech Republic, which were historically weak for the DRV, the 26-year-old won gold, the only German medal in the Olympic boat classes. In addition to Zeidler, only one other boat, the women’s double scull, was represented in one of the 14 final races. The women finished the race in sixth and last place.
The goal is the 2028 Olympics
“We have a new board, with competitive sport being the main responsibility of the sports director. We have initiated so many new things that it also takes time to take effect, many don’t see that,” said Bielig, who consulted an external consulting agency to solve the problem welcomes: “It’s good when someone looks at it from the outside. I’m convinced we’re not doing that much wrong.”
According to the national coach, who has been in office since October 2021, the association needs time to catch up with the world leaders again. For the Summer Games in Paris 2024, the goal is not “that we can improve the result of the Olympics,” said Bielig: “If we can achieve the two medals from Tokyo 2021 again, we would have achieved our goal. Our long-term structure goes until 2028 .”