Jan Behrendt

Jan Behrendt ( born November 29, 1967 in Ilmenau ) is a former German luger, who took first for the GDR and from 1990 for the reunified Germany.

Behrendt reached his greatest success in the doubles as "sub- man " with his partner Stefan Krausse. Krauße Behrendt and rose rapidly in the international forefront and gained between 1988 and 1998 four Olympic medals, including two Olympic medals (1992 and 1998). There were seven and two European titles and 27 World Cup wins and three first-place finishes in the World Cup, that made the duo to the successful double -1990s.

Career

Beginnings and first Olympic participation ( to 1988 )

Already in school enrollment in 1974 learned Behrendt his later partner in doubles, the two months older Stefan Krausse, know. Four years later, the two began Ilmenau with the sport of luge, where she first started respectively in the single-seater. Until 1982 they changed together on the two-seater and onward formed a team, with the 18 inches smaller and about 20 kg lighter Behrendt took the role of " sub 's". Later Krausse, who was responsible as a "pilot " for controlling justified, the decision for the team building so that they are very similar because of their restrained temperament. Even after 16 years of compound, which was referred to in the media as " athlete's marriage," Krausse and Behrendt remained friends and kept in touch since they lived both in the same place.

The first international competition challenged the then 17 -year-olds in 1985 at the Junior European Championship on the Combined ice rink in Koenigssee, where they won the bronze medal together. A year later, the two lugers reached the same result at the Junior World Championship, which was also held in Koenigssee. Within a few years the double had established itself in the national forefront, to which also belonged the duo Jörg Hoffmann and Jochen Pietzsch. Hoffmann and Pietzsch, who entered as Krauße and Behrendt for successful DDR club ASK forward Oberhof were 1983-1987 three times won the World Cup and were thus as heavy favorites for the Olympic title, which was awarded in 1988 in Calgary. Indeed, Hoffmann and Pietzsch won the Olympic competition, behind Krauße and Behrendt were second. At a press conference after the Olympics Jörg Hoffmann praised the raised performances of the 20 -year-old Olympic debutant, saying it could be her successor once. Krauße and Behrendt explained then, they could be abschauen in training " as some gimmick " of the Olympic champions.

Establishment in the world rankings and the first Olympic champion ( 1988-1994 )

In the following Olympics Krauße and Behrendt solved the few years older double Hoffmann / Pietzsch as the strongest national - from power - and therefore international. In 1989, she was in Winterberg first time world champion, also in 1991, after they had missed the 1990 title. Moreover, the two lugers started after the German reunification on for the GDR, but for the reunified Germany. This was accompanied by the dissolution of their old association, the ASK forward Oberhof, in 1990. Successor club was the WSV Oberhof 05, 1993 from the runners sport out dissolved as BSR Rennsteig Oberhof. Thus Krauße Behrendt and competed throughout her career for three different teams, although they never changed their location. New instructor was the German national coach Josef Lenz, who described the duo as "a pair of thick as thieves ". In the Olympic season 1991/92 Krauße / Behrendt knüpften not initially on the successes of previous years. The winter dominated the South Tyrolean Hansjörg Raffl and Norbert Huber, who had decided all World Cup races and the European Championship for himself and so were also favorites for the Olympic Games in Albertville. There, however, were victorious this time Krauße and Behrendt, who saw it as their advantage in retrospect, that they had the legs tightened, thereby triggering the light barrier a little later.

Between Olympics in Albertville in 1992 and subsequent Olympic competition in Lillehammer were due to the decision not to allow summer and take place in the same year Winter Games, only two years and thus only one World Cup, which was held in Calgary in 1993. Krauße Behrendt and secured there for the third time in four years the title in doubles and won also - as in 1991 - also the team competition, in which they represented Germany, among others, together with Georg Hackl and Susi Erdmann. After the duo was successfully driven in the World Cup season 1993/ 94 and had decided four of the six World Cup races and the first time the World Cup itself, enumerated Krauße and Behrendt 1994 again one of the favorites for the Olympic gold medal. In Lillehammer, however, they lost because of an error in the second race of the Italian Double Kurt Brugger / Wilfried Huber and only won the bronze medal.

End of career with the second Olympic victory ( 1994-1998 )

The Games of Lillehammer was followed by another successful Olympic Games for the two Ilmenau, belonging now to the older pairs in the doubles field. At the national level, they still remained the duo with the best results, although several years younger Skel / Wöller and Mankel / Rudolph also won medals and triumphed in the World Cup. Nevertheless, were Krauße and Behrendt both the 1994/95 season and the following winter overall World Cup winner in 1995 and secured the world title in 1996 as well as winning the European Championship. This triumph was the first to be made ​​into a double in the continental competitions secured after it had won the bronze medal twice. In the pre-Olympic season 1996/97 the double remained Titellos; behind the Austrian team Schiegl / Schiegl it reached the silver medal. In the test competition on the Olympic track of Nagano Krauße and Behrendt fared little success and were placed far back on the grid. In response, they were at the beginning of winter 1997/98, their carriage at the Institute for Research and Development of Sports Equipment (FES ) in Berlin modernize, but mounted daraunter the existing blades with which they had won in Albertville almost six years earlier.

The season 1997/98 was for the now 30 -year-old athlete the final. Last career highlight was the Olympic competitions in Nagano, the fourth matches in which Krauße and Behrendt took part. Previously, she presented with two more World Cup victories, a record of the Italians Hansjörg Raffl and Norbert Huber, who had decided how the Ilmenau 27 races of the highest competition class for itself. Despite a Traingssturzes, in which Stefan Krausse drew upon a rib and leg injury, was able to double before the Olympics to re-establish the connection to the top. The German duo won at the European Championships, in which the Americans Mark Grimmette and Brian Martin, however, lacked the main competitors for the Olympic Games. In the training runs on the track in Nagano both Krauße and Behrendt and Grimmette and Martin showed good performance; one of these teams was in the lead with most training rides. In the first of two passes, the Germans took the lead right off the bat, of which they were not displaced in the final run. Looking back at the second passage, were not optimal down in the middle part Krauße and Behrendt, Jan Behrendt said that he had initially thought it was all over. However, the error was the double offset by a good performance in the last part of the route, so Krauße Behrendt and 0.22 seconds ahead of Olympic champion for the second time were.

Following the games of Stefan Krausse and Jan Behrendt Nagano withdrew from active competitive sports. The German national coach Thomas Schwab commented on the End of career: "More you can not win; since it is almost speechless as a coach. " Athletes self-declared their decision was that there would have been no more athletic goals. At the same time, they confirmed it was a good time. Following the resignation sat Behrendt, who was appointed a week after Olympic honorary citizen of the town of Ilmenau, it began in 1995 training as a banker continued. A few years before her career end, he had to publicly annoyed as part of a World Cup competition, the fact that the doubles less media attention than is the single seaters. The prize money for an Olympic medal, the two-seater would get together 15,000 marks from the German Sports Aid; even that they would have to share. The record of 27 World Cup victories, the Krauße and Behrendt had erected in 1998, was exceeded at the beginning of the season 2007/ 08 of their compatriots Patric Leitner and Alexander Resch.

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