Dramatic descents in Bormio: injuries overshadow the race

Dramatic descents in Bormio: injuries overshadow the race

in Bormio, where the speed stars of the ski alpine are getting back into the race today, serious accidents have heated the minds in the past few weeks. A total of 21 potential participants are injured and have to expose in the Super-G and on the departure, which further tightens the already tense competition conditions. "It has never gone to business as sharp as this year," Daniel Hemetsberger criticized the risky conditions. A central point of the discussion is the use of carbon-shin-protectors that not only protect against injuries, but also increase the stability of the athletes and thus make the selection of line even more aggressively, as krone.at reported.

The fall of the French skier Cyprien Sarrazin was particularly dramatic. After a violent impact, he was removed with a helicopter and suffered a subdural hematoma, a dangerous bleeding in the brain that required immediate operation. The French Ski Association announced that Sarrazin is in a stable state in the neurological intensive care unit and is initially recovering in an artificial coma. These incidents throw a bright light on the precarious conditions on the route, which Marco Odermatt also classified as "life -threatening", while other athletes like Nils Allègre criticized the route conditions hard. "The slope is really bad, it is dangerous and not nice to look at," said Allègre unleashed in an interview with Eurosport .

The criticism of the athletes is rejected by Markus Waldner, the FIS race director, as "not entirely justified". While 65 athletes survived the route unscathed, the extreme weather conditions are cited as the primary factor for the high risk of injury. "It is an open -air sport and not a dream concert," says Waldner, who ultimately sees responsibility among the athletes who have to decide whether they want to compete under such conditions. While the enthusiasm for the games is growing in the coming year, both athletes and organizers are under pressure to find suitable solutions for these high -risk conditions.