21 days in Olympic quarantine – that’s how the snowboarder feels
For her big goal, the Valais woman accepts three weeks of isolation in China – probably as the only athlete in the world. Now she tells how busy she is.
–Strength and balance training in the hotel room: Patrizia Kummer (34) in quarantine in Beijing.
Photo: Swiss-Ski
It’s half past five in the evening in Beijing. At Patrizia Kummer’s there is a knock on the hotel room door. She says: “Wait a minute, I have to get the food in.”
The 34-year-old Valais snowboarder has been in China for eight days. The 2014 Olympic champion in parallel giant slalom is unvaccinated and had to therefore in quarantine. In a Chinese hotel, for 21 days – worldwide is von nobody known that he himself Likewise for diesen would have decided to take an arduous path in order to be able to take part in the Olympics.
Kummer has therefore been overwhelmed with interview requests, and foreign media are also involved in the group chat. The food will have to wait now.
Why isn’t she getting vaccinated?
Patrizia Kummer says these are personal reasons. She is “not against vaccination per se” and has already been vaccinated against the flu. But she doesn’t want to talk about the reason, “nobody has to justify themselves. I expect people to treat each other with respect and to follow the rules.”
She knows that she is walking a lonely path, “many people said to themselves, the job comes first. I say: Ma body comes first.” She doesn’t discuss vaccination with other people, not even on the snowboard team. And not in the family either. “When my mother asked me if she and my father should get vaccinated, I told them it was not my choice. That I can’t empathize with her after all,” she says. She believes that she can be so successful, “my great strength is that I stood by myself”.
–The 2014 Olympic champion believes she can find success down this path, too.
Photo: Swiss-Ski
She pays for the quarantine herself
When it became clear that anyone who was not vaccinated had to go into quarantine, si begane a hard time. “We were five riders for four places, I knew that I would miss at least the last World Cup race if I had to be in quarantine for 21 days.» Once again she questioned whether the effort was worth it, I worked with Swiss–Ski and Swiss Olympic discussed, “there was a lot of pressure in terms of time. But I thought it was worth it.” On Tuesday, to the Sixth day after arriving in Beijing, Patrizia Kummer found out that she was selected for the February 8th race. With the otheren case she didn’t bother. “I don’t waste energy on such things.”
Apparently nobody expected them after landing in Beijing. “I was asked where I had to go,” she laughs, saying she made it clear that she didn’t know either. After half an hour they found out which hotel was the quarantine hotel.
She pays for these costs herself, and now takes over the flight, since it is selected, subsequently Swiss Olympic. On the outward flight, she noticed that the Chinese were making “a lot of effort” in the fight against the virus. So she was woken up twice on the plane to take her temperature and change her mask. At the hotel they ask for the temperature twice a day – everyone wears protective suits, or as Kummer says “moon suits”. “I don’t find the whole situation difficult, but interesting. It’s like an adventure for me.”
The window and brought fitness equipment
Patrizia Kummer does not come up with cockroach pictures of how the German tobogganist Tobias Arlt shocked the sports world in December. On the contrary. She lives in a spacious room in a western chain hotel for three weeks. She has divided “more than 25 square meters” into different areas: sleeping, Reside, train, work. And very important for her, who describes herself as a sports junkie and prefers to be outdoors: the window can be opened. “That’s why I’m very happy – also because they cook with a lot of garlic.” She laughs.
–Patrizia Kummer rearranged the room so that the four areas of sleeping, living, training and working were created.
Photo: Swiss-Ski
An exercise bike can be seen in the background, “this bike was put in there for me. I’m happy about it – because of the endurance.” Dumbbells are also available, but she brought along smaller fitness equipment such as skipping ropes, mats, coordination ladders and juggling balls.
Mentally no difficulties
It’s hard to say how many athletes would dare to retreat to a single room and to themselves for three weeks. There seems no doubt that Patrizia Kummer will master it. One of her mottos is: “Life begins at the end of your comfort zone”. Life begins where you leave your comfort zone.
Seen from the outside, she left them with her decision, but she says: “I knew what I was getting into, mentally I’m really good.” And she knows that this will not change in the next two weeks either. “I am an extremely positive person. I don’t have any thoughts that it will catch up with me in the third week.” The woman knows each other very well, she talks about such negative thoughts of the “self-fulfilling prophecy”, a process from her specialty: Patrizia Kummer did a master’s degree in neuro- and developmental psychology after studying psychology.
Run the café and organize the conversion
In the morning after breakfast she trains, “the larger and more intensive units”. Around noon, lunch is brought to her, Chinese food, which she likes very much. In the afternoon, lighter training sessions and yoga follow, “and in between I work,” she says and begins to list. For two days so far, she followed an online training course in Chinese medicine, took care of her Bed & Breakfast and Café Hangenbrigga, which she runs in her parents’ house in Mühlebach VS. And also organized things for remodeling an old house that she bought.
So her life is much more than snowboarding. She wishes that she none, nafter this media appointment, “finds peace”. EThere are two weeks left until the team arrives. It will be the day when she can leave the quarantine and switch to the board. “My advantage is that I don’t have jet lag, and everyone here has to get used to the snow.”
Almost an hour has passed and she says goodbye. Dinner has gotten cold.
Monica Schneider has been an editor in the sports department since 1995 and accompanies track and field athletes and many others on their way to the Olympic Games. She also works as a sheet editor for the sports department.
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