BET-KE

He already has a full right to say. Still, the words on Saturday night are pronounced silently, restlessly, distructively: “I won the World Cup.”

“What does it sound like, Gabin?”

No, it’s not a joke. It is a dream that has just changed into reality. Gabriela Soukalová is the owner of the big globe. Mission completed.

It was enough for her to win the 9th place on Saturday. Or that Marie Dorin-Habert did not win. The Czech woman held the best cards and could be relatively quiet before the fighter race.But can she stay calm when she is at stake and when she is a biathlete whose quaint events of hectic spurs on the start or lost wands become legendary?

Anything else could happen.

You knew it.

And that’s how it did.

, four hours to start the fighter. She can not even eat, her stomach does not take lunch. State of mind? “I feel anxiously like a caterpillar under the wheel.” But also the masseuse Petra Sedláčková reports: “I did not see Gabch yet.” How does she know? “You did not even meet me before the race.”

Gavina is tired, sees coach Zdeněk Vítek, but she tells her:” Enjoy it. ”

The director of the transmission offers shots Soukalove and next detail of the big globe , set in the snow. Yes, it is a bank that wants to choose.

The second one is running out and it takes a while to get on the track. Even Norka Olsbu overcame her. “She’s upset,” says Vitek about Norce. So soon the trio of best spins together. Until Mäkäräinen and Soukalova run one goal.

NA TRATI I NA STŘELNICI. Gabriela Soukalová and Marie Dorinová-Habertová fight in a fighter race.

She comes to the second ladle and shakes her hands. She smells: I have to change something.Then she’ll start firing in the middle of the second!

“She tried to get a little bit different,” says Vitek. “This is what Gabin does when he needs to straighten his head.” It concentrates, interferes with all the targets.

Once again, he is in the front group.

From Dorinova-Habertová’s back positions. She will not give up. He’s already with them. After the third shoot, Soukal is on the road ahead of the others, the two biggest squadrons, two rivals in the battle of the globe. How symbolic.

STAY. At the third, Soukalova is in position 3 between Wierre (No. 5) and Dorin.One of them is about a small globe, the other one about the big one.

Vitek nervously knocks on his pants. Soukalova exhorts: Do not overstate the points in the head. Let the others go by hand, concentrate on yourself.

The last item. “Sámaja trúdnaja, sámaja ťjažólaja,” the harsh announcer in the arena. The hardest one.

The French does not give the second blow, Czech third. She is hit by a train of six women, each of whom can win. It’s terrible, she thinks. A stunning finale of stars, worthy of a big globe. The Mäkäräinen falls, Soukalova follows her.Finka is, however, elusive.

“When Kaisa came in, the rest of us were only second,” says Dorin. “Vitek runs along the shooting range, clinging to the barrier 200 meters ahead of the target, which is already the head of the union Jiri Hamza, yelling at the woman in blue suit.

BITVA STAR. Soukalová and Dorinová at the shooting range and exhausted winner Kaisa Mäkaräinen at the finish.

Goal. Finka wins, Dorin is the second, Wiere’s third. Soukalová finishes fourth and winning. He has not only the second small globe, but above all…the big one!

“The bomb,” he’ll come out of Vitosha. When he is able to make more sophisticated sentences, he interprets: “Rybis (chief fisherman Fisher) gave us the task of letting us bring some globe, if possible big.So we went into it. ”

Sedlakova is at Soukalova, both tears run out. The owner of the globe shuts her hands, as if praying, the gesture conceals the gloom and the girl’s amazement: Oops, I did it very well. Glowing Hamza slaps her. Vitek and the champion of his senses get rid of his jump in his arms.

Who would be surprised to get involved in his own words. “I’m as if someone’s been hit by my head,” Soukalova says, pulling out his hands: “He’s happy is incalculable. Mazec. I have a big globe. There is nothing more. I’m more happy than after the Olympic medals. It’s just there! ”

And it’s ME.Little Globe Number Two Sprint’s Fleece added.

He walks in the snow on the podium, still “only” for a small globe for a fighter that he defended against Italian Wierer. He needs to wait a day to hand over the big one. Only after the Sunday mass race is he in the arena to receive it.

This was the best

he can not sleep on Sunday, the thoughts swirling confused in his head. So I’ll take a moment with myself, think and say again aloud: “I won the World Cup.”

It still feels unreal.

should be used to what? “he says on Sunday.

The wind blows at a speed of 15 meters per second, the final race is postponed.And when the artificial light pole collapses directly on the shooting range, it’s over. Canceled without compensation. The cup ends. Without going out of the room, it has a third small globe, for mass start racing.

POHODA. A moment ago, the hotel learned she would not be racing on Sunday.

“This was the best globe,” she laughs, comfortably sitting in the hotel’s chair on the seven hills.Martin Fourcade passes around, congratulates her.

“It will come to me like a parody,” says Soukalova when the Frenchman loses in the corridor. ”

No, you have not gotten used to it yet…

And in 10 seconds it is sold

Now just determine where your last two globes will get. “And the party will eventually be, no, no,” he says.

It’s a perfect irony.

First of all, the IBU officials have canceled the gala evening. But when Sunday races canceled Sunday weather, what now?They do not give trophies to their owners in the hotel rooms.

And so athletes on Sunday afternoon learn: At 21.00 announcing globes + afterparty at the hotel Olimpijskaja.

True, the backdrops are quickly evacuated and illuminated dining rooms are modest. “This is a graduation party compared to last year’s huge hall,” says Petr Slavík, a photographer of the Czech team.

Soukalova will present her red dress from Beata Rajská, IBU chief Anders Besseberg long-haired, three hostesses smile, the speakers sound the jingle, the last small globes are distributed and then the entertainer in English, Russian and later also the broken Czech “Gabriela Soukalova, World Cup champion, twenty-six.”

He will come in the boats on stage, where Besseberg puts a big globe in his hands. It’s so short.

“You’ve been training a globe for a lot of years, and it’s all gone in 10 seconds,” says the champion. “But I’ll take that feeling in my memories forever.He’ll keep me warm and never hurt. ”

He kisses him. “Crystal kiss,” he smiles and poses with Martin Fourcad. “For him, it’s probably not so great anymore, he’s got enough of these globes. But it is an honor for me to stand by the side of such a biatlon nadzamce. ”

The party is just starting, but it suddenly falls on all the fatigue 113 days that have elapsed since the first shot of the 2015/2016 cup up to this moment. The body, switched on until the last day of standby, is suddenly exhausted. She’s hiding behind a pillar for a while to escape the crowd.

Was she paying for a party girl before? It used to be. Now he admits: “The next plan is simple.”

The champion leaves the announcement among the first.