It's been six months since Meinhard Erlacher (ITA) was introduced as new head Coach for the Italian alpine snowboard team. The former athlete who competed in 119 World Cup races from 2001 till 2014 followed up Erich Pramsohler (till 2014) and Andrea Matteoli who was responsible for the strong roster last season.
And as both predecessors have left some pretty successful footsteps in the snow and now being the coach of Olympic and world championships medallists, Erlacher feels the pressure of success.
But despite the fact that he has changed the side of being an athlete and becoming a coach just one season ago, the three-time Olympian and six-time world championships competitor is confident that he will be able to tie on to his countries good results:
“It's nothing new to me. I already worked as an assistant coach last winter. Last March, our Race Director Cesare Pisoni offered me the job as Head Coach,” remembers Erlacher, who didn't had to think twice before signing the contract.
“Our goals are simple: we want to repeat the good results from last year and earn more World Cup points.”
It's not unlikely that the 33-year-old and his protégés will achieve this ambitious goal.
The Italian roster features big names like Roland Fischnaller, the reigning pgs world champion and, some well-experienced riders with multiple World Cup podium results such as Aaron Fischnaller plus some up-and-coming talents like Nadya Ochner, Christoph Mick or Mirko Felicetti, just to name a few.
“It's a great mix. The young guns are willing to beat the older ones and the old ones want to stay ahead. Everybody pushes each other!”
While Erlacher can built up on a good team with his personal experience of 13 years on the Word Cup tour as a rider, the South Tyrolean also knows where he personally has some potential to improve.
“I learnt a lot over the past years from my former coaches or having been an assistant coach but as I didn't have that much time on the other side yet, there wasn't enough room so far for me to specialize as a coach. I basically started working as a coach ever since I retired after Sochi.”
However, Erlacher won't be responsible all alone. 'Meini' will work together with another former World Cup athlete as Rudy Galli joined the staff, too.
“We have been on tour for quite a long time together. And I look forward to work together with him whilst I do hope to do so with the other teams on the World Cup tour, too. I cannot wait until the season finally kicks off and hope to see a lot of good races which hopefully turn out successfully for us.”
At least the current training camp seems to turn out like it should be with 50 centimetres of fresh snow on the Passo Stelvio.
“We are now praying for some sunny weather for the next days”, says Meinacher whose first race as Head Coach will be the Europa Cup opener in Landgraaf where the world's best are supposed to meet for the first time in the 2015-16 winter season.
Source: fis-ski.com
