The great Polish champion has become an outcast in her homeland. She just helped the Belarusian family

Because of Russophobia today, not only our, but also foreign sports suffer. In some countries, athletes, who until recently were considered the pride of the nation, turn into outcasts because of the “wrong” position – or even hints of it.

There is no more successful skier in Poland than Justina Kowalczyk. But the status of a two-time Olympic champion did not save her from criticism and pressure from her own fans and colleagues.

The girl had just to help a man once – and now she was forced to resign.

The main competitor of the Norwegians

The end of the 2000s and the middle of the 2010s is the era of bright confrontations between the Norwegians Marit Bjorgen and Teresa Yohaug with Justina Kowalczyk and the Swedish Charlotte Kalla. Back in 2006, the 23-year-old athlete won the first Olympic medal in the history of Poland, starting the final 30 km marathon distance in Turin and losing in the finish line to Czech Kateryna Neumanova and our Yulia Chepalova.

Starting from the next season, the polka finally entered the top of the world skiing and three years later became the winner of the Tour de Ski and the overall World Cup standings, and also took two gold medals in the world championship in Czech Liberec.

Photo: © Arnd Hemmersbach / NordicFocus / Contributor / Getty Images Sport / Gettyimages.ru

Well, then the time of the great confrontation between Bjorgen and Kowalczyk began. In Vancouver 2010, the Norwegian beat the polka twice: in the duathlon and sprint in the classic style. Justina responded by winning the 30 km mass start. In addition to the sports confrontation between the girls, there was a conflict on the topic of doping.

Kowalczyk, who herself served a year-long ban for using dexamethasone in 2005, accused Marit of gaining an undeserved advantage on the ski track by taking her asthma medication. Although, of course, the Norwegian had all the necessary medical certificates.

A year later, at the World Championships in Holmenkollen, Bjorgen dominated: four golds. Kowalczyk clung to the podium, where each time she was forced to fight besides Marit with her future successor, Teresa Johaug. At the 2014 Sochi Games, the Polish skier managed to perform only in the 10 km race in the classic style, but, to the surprise of everyone, she won her second Olympic gold medal, ahead of both Kalla and Johaug with Bjorgen.

The anger of the fans

Kowalczyk shelved her skis at the same time as Bjorgen in 2018 and immediately became an assistant coach for the Polish women’s cross-country skiing team. In December 2020, the legendary champion came face to face with the inadequacy of some fans.

By that time, having married and changed her surname to Kowalczyk-Tekieli, the Polish athlete decided to publicly rejoice at the success of the Latvian skier Patricia Eiduki, who took eighth place at the World Cup in Davos:

— My girl! I’m in tears,” Justina wrote on her page on the social network.

Patricia Eiduka / Photo: © TF-Images / Contributor / DeFodi Images / Gettyimages.ru

The Latvian athlete trained with the Polish team, so Justina’s awe was quite understandable. But in response, she received a mountain of angry comments from Polish fans who accused her of supporting the representative of another country. Strictly speaking, it would be strange to rejoice at the 36th place of compatriot Isabella Martsish. What, in fact, Kowalczyk-Tekieli tried to explain to subscribers, but to no avail. As a result, the girl had to send annoying readers in a rather rude manner.

Belarusian support cost a career

In March last year, Justyna changed jobs and became a sports director at the Polish Biathlon Union. However, the change of activities did not benefit the champion. Recently it became known that she resigned. The reason turned out to be extremely unexpected:

There were several situations that led to this. First of all, we are talking about the family of Sergei Dolidovich, – says the girl.

The fact is that Yustina helped the famous Belarusian skier Sergei Dolidovich move with his family from Belarus to Poland and settle here. But the Polish Biathlon Union reacted negatively to this. Despite the fact that Dolidovich has a promising skier daughter Daria, who can now continue her career in Poland. But the two-time Olympic champion did not meet understanding:

“I quit because I don’t want to work in such conditions,” Kowalczyk-Tekieli concluded.

Together with Yustina, her team also left the organization: Alexander Veretelny, Adam Jakila (from team B) and Lukasz Slonina (from the youth team). Although the Polish national team is not even in the top 15 best biathlon teams in the world, such perturbations are hardly a good sign for athletes. However, this story once again showed that for the sports authorities of some countries it is now much more important to adhere to a certain political course than to be professionals in their field.