Straight talk from ÖSV girl

“We know it’s a risky sport, but…”

Victoria Olivier is the reigning junior downhill world champion and is competing in her first full speed season in the European Cup this winter.(Bild: GEPA pictures)

The weather proved to be a spoilsport on Tuesday in Sella Nevea, Italy! Instead of downhill training, the ÖSV ladies played a game of volleyball. And plenty of time to talk - including about the unfortunate series of nasty falls that have led to life-threatening injuries in some cases this winter. 

"It first snowed more than a meter at the top and then rained quite a long way up," explained Victoria Olivier, explaining why the second training session for the European Cup double downhill in Sella Nevea (It) also fell through yesterday. "Now we're going to train on Wednesday and race on Thursday and Friday. We have to remain flexible."

Leonie Zegg and Victoria Olivier (r.) had plenty of time after the training was canceled.(Bild: GEPA pictures)

"Now these crashes are something else"
Instead of racing down the mountain at over 100 km/h, "Vici" went to the volleyball hall with her ÖSV teammates in the afternoon, played "Cabo" and talked. They also talked about the series of injuries that continued last week in Garmisch with Tereza Nova (Tch), Stephanie Chenal (Sz) and Nina Ortlieb being ruled out. "Fortunately, I didn't see the crashes," admits the 20-year-old from Au. "In previous years, these events were further away for me. But now that I'm on the downhill myself, it's a different story."

As soon as you think about it for a second at the start, doubt or hesitate, it's over. When you're riding, you have to ride with full conviction. Otherwise it becomes dangerous.

Victoria Olivier

Bild: GEPA pictures

Not watching the crashes also serves as self-protection for the reigning junior world champion. "Otherwise it would become too real for me, if I let it get too close to me," she explains. "As soon as you think about it for a second at the start, doubt it or hesitate, it's over. When you're riding, you have to ride with full conviction. Otherwise it becomes dangerous."

In a way that has recently changed again in her eyes, as the case of Nova from the Czech Republic shows. She suffered a brain haemorrhage in Garmisch, had to be operated on and put into an induced coma. "For her, but also for Cyprien Sarrazin, it really is a matter of life and not - in quotation marks - just a knee injury," says Vici.

When Victoria Olivier throws herself out of the starting gate of a downhill, she must have no doubts.(Bild: Peter Weihs/Kronenzeitung)

"If I have doubts, I don't race!"
As an athlete, she sees it as her job to point things out so that the international federation does something. "I'm struggling myself because I don't really know what can be changed. We want to race, we want to be fast. And we all know that it's a risky sport. The question is just up to what point it is worth the risk." For herself, however, she has clarified the question. "If I have even the slightest doubt before a downhill, I won't race. I've learned that much from my past," Olivier clarifies.