"The most difficult race"

Liensberger: “I didn’t feel well afterwards”

Katharina Liensberger

(Bild: Birbaumer Christof)

"Rarely has a race taken me so hard, I really didn't feel well afterwards," said bronze medal winner Katharina Liensberger openly about the team combined competition at the World Ski Championships in Saalbach.

Katharina Liensberger knows that she polarizes more than others among the ÖSV stars. "The criticism doesn't affect me as much because I can be very stubborn. The waving thing is already so ingrained in me, for me waving also means showing appreciation to the fans," explained the 27-year-old after winning slalom bronze. "It's a shame if someone doesn't understand me in that respect. But no matter how many voices there are, at the end of the day it's me and I don't want to pretend."

Liensberger found that his own expectations were exaggerated in the botched team combined. "It was the most difficult race of my career. I never expected to be so nervous," she said about Tuesday, when she took over from Mirjam Puchner in third place and the Austria 1 duo finished fifth. "Rarely has a race taken me down like that, I really didn't feel well afterwards."

Even after Puchner's downhill run, she was thinking about a medal. "Just getting it down turned into a hell of a task because I realized: Oops, I'm so nervous. The expectations I had of myself were exceeded. I was no longer liberated, I really wanted to do it and then I couldn't." The Vorarlberg native found her inner balance again before the special slalom on Saturday. "Thank God I managed to focus on the essentials again. It was about skiing again and not about what was possible."

Cortina 2021 hard to digest
Bronze shone like gold for Liensberger, according to her own statement. After her surprising double world championship title in Cortina d'Ampezzo 2021, she fell into a deep hole from which she first had to free herself. "Coming home from Cortina with three medals, two in gold, and then the World Cup globe on top of that was so much, I had to get over it. Now I'm ready for that certain lightness again."