normal magazin nummer18 sommer

Lena Häcki beim Schiess- training im Sommer.

Jubel nach geschafftem Auf- stieg. Lena Häcki freut sich auf die rasante Abfahrt. Jubilation after making it to the top! Now Lena looks for- ward to a thrilling descent.

Lena Häcki working on her shoot- ing technique in the summer.

Few female biathletes can match Lena Häcki’s strength and stamina – even if she misses a few shots, her powerful legs ensure her a good position in the rankings. Most recently, the 20-year-old won two silver medals at the Biath- lon Junior World Championships in January. Her hometown of Engelberg offers perfect training conditions, whatever the season, for working towards her dream of winning an Olympic medal. At the 2016 Junior World Champion- ships, the young A-squad Swiss Ski biath lete

siona l ath lete is not a given: “Ever yone has to f ight for a chance to compete in the World Cup, which is why I’m so happy to have made it.” Lena goes back to Engelberg whenever she can; in winter, she can on ly go for about three days at a time af ter three to four weeks away. From May, however, she will be able to stay home a lit tle longer. Af ter two weeks at training camp and a week at the training centre in Andermat t, she will be spending a f u ll week in Engelberg. The young ath lete enjoys being with her family and spending time in the mountains. She looks forward to seeing ing oppor tunities in Engelberg. “In summer I go cycling, jogging and roller skiing,” she says. Lena’s favourite mountain bike destina- tions are the Joch Pass and the Brunni moun- tain hut, and she enjoys jogging the leng th of the va lley. Engelberg is a lso the idea l place for her to per fec t her shooting technique. In summer she goes to the shooting range and in winter to the shooting facilities in the tug of war ha ll, which she can access on her skis straight f rom the trail and then prac tise shooting when the adrena line is pumping. The biggest cha llenge in biath lon is keeping a steady hand in the shooting despite your rapid hear t rate. “The combination of push- ing yourself to the limit and then switching to pure concentration for the shooting round makes biath lon a rea lly exciting spor t,” Lena says. She still has time to per fec t her shooting technique before the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang. It ’s a lready clear that she has the leg streng th to make it to the top. familiar faces in the street and stopping for a chat. And because she has to train by herself when she is home, she appreciates the train-

missed the target si x times in the 10 km pursuit race. But despite the si x pena lty loops, she still came second. By way of comparison, the gold meda llist didn’ t put a foot wrong in the shooting,

Few female athletes are as fast as Lena Häcki on cross-country skis.

yet she on ly beat Lena to the f inish line by 13 seconds. “It takes a lot of prac tice to shoot at such a high level,” says Lena. “I still lack the ex- perience and complete self-conf idence.” That ’s understandable, given that Lena f irst got into cross-countr y skiing and biath lon at the age of 14. As a good ath letic a ll-rounder with plenty of stamina, she instantly took to cross- countr y skiing, which, when combined with rif le shooting, became par ticu larly exciting. “I wasn’ t that good at f irst. But I rea lly liked it, so I prac tised a lot and quick ly got much bet ter,” she says. So quick ly that she then at tended Engelberg’s Spor tmit telschu le, and made her World Cup debut in 2014 , where she ranked 12th and began grabbing at tention. Just a year later, she was an established member of the Swiss World Cup Team, and has since been travelling the world with the Gasparin sisters. “They’ve a lways been my role models; I’m so happy I can train and compete a longside them,” she says. Lena knows being on the road as a profes-

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