Marlen Reusser, whose last race was on 19 May, does not hide her emotions and fears in the documentary that SRF dedicated to her on Tuesday evening. The Bernese, whose health is affected, does not know when she will be able to resume competition or if she will be able to aim for victory again. “It’s frustrating for me,” she confides.
The great dream of an Olympic victory in Paris or a triumph at the World Championships at home in Zurich has flown away for the 32-year-old runner. In 2024, she wanted to be “the best version of herself”. But respiratory infections and a serious fall at the end of March at the Tour of Flanders led to the worst-case scenario. The 2021 Olympic vice-champion fractured her jaw, both ear canals and 8 teeth.
Despite a return to competition in May, however, the problems and withdrawals continued. For 4 weeks, she suffered from high temperatures and was unable to train on her bike.
Health, the only concern
“I need a lot of patience. There are people who don’t recover.”says Reusser, who believes she was too arrogant to think that things would get better for her. “Now I have much more humility. I can’t be sure that I will recover. It’s a particular perspective, in which I don’t want to commit myself too firmly.”
ats/alt
Published at 08:04 Amended at 09:28
Post-covid syndrome
Marlen Reusser suffers from post-Covid syndrome and already has to deal with increased symptoms and fever during relatively light exertion. So training at a high level is still out of the question for her.
There are phases “where I’m so bad that I can’t do anything” and others “where I was in a semi-comatose state in my bed and I was in a state of limbo in my head”explains a visibly emotional Reusser in the SRF documentary. “Uber Gold, Pech and Leidenschaft”.
Sometimes the Bernese woman also feels energy and manages to make plans. “But as soon as I want to do them, it messes me up.”. She is “currently chronically ill”she admits.
“I had to give up everything”
At the end of the SRF documentary, Marlen Reusser declares that she has “next season in mind, but not in hands. I have learned that in the meantime. It is not me who decides, but it is decided for me”. The World Championships, the Olympics, almost the whole season, “I had to drop everything. I couldn’t train or do anything else. The focus now is much more clearly on my health and getting back into shape.”
Marlen Reusser doesn’t know when she will be able to take the next steps in her comeback, whether it will be a matter of weeks or months. For the three-time European champion and world time trial medallist, there are still other things to sort out, including the question of her employer. Her contract with the SD Worx team, which she joined in 2022, expires at the end of this year. But that’s the least of her worries for now.
