“Companies can fail,” says Andreas Bechmann: “The German Athletics Association will not go bankrupt.” Image: Ben Kilb
The decathlete and start-up entrepreneur Andreas Bechmann talks in an interview about his departure from the German national squad, financial worries and errors in the sports system.
Mr. Bechmann, in 2021 you became the U-23 European champion in the decathlon in Tallinn, but last year you were no longer nominated for the perspective squad for athletics. How did that happen?
I lost this grant due to the incorrect assumption that I was not injured. The problem appears to be due to communication gaps within the association. Even if I don’t want to speak of collective failure, there are similar cases in the association that lead to a high number of failures overall. Another crucial criterion for nomination is the combination of current performance and perspective. Of course, no one can look into the big crystal ball and predict which of the talented young athletes could become Olympic champions. As the reigning U-23 European champion and fifth in the European Indoor Championships, I would think that should be enough, but that wasn’t the case. Now I’m lucky enough to be self-employed and receive a small salary as the founder and CEO of Preventio, from a start-up. But I am aware that this is an exception.
