He kept vomiting and was afraid of death, the 25-year-old athlete couldn’t take it anymore

Even on Saturday, Markus Fossland took part in a competition held in Hemsedal, Norway, and after he was eliminated in the second race of downhill skiing, he announced on his social media that he was quitting elite sports. The 25-year-old Norwegian athlete based his decision to retire primarily on physical problems, because according to his own admission, he has been suffering from back pain for six years, regularly vomits and has a fear of death before alpine skiing competitions, and has been thinking about ending his career for three years.

This is why Markus Fossland decided to retire

“I don’t even know where to start because it was a difficult decision, but I’m going to stop alpine skiing. This season has been difficult, due to my accident in Wengen I had to take three weeks off at the end of January, then a week after my return I tore two ligaments in my ankle during a training session in Italy, which resulted in another three weeks of rest to fit into my ski boots. This season, my results have deteriorated significantly, but this is not the reason why I am retiring, wrote Markus Fossland on his social media page. –

I’m having a hard time dealing with the pressure on my whole spine from the current external ski. On race days, I was able to manage the pain for a race, but training days were no longer so easy. Secondly, this year I have experienced a change in perspective regarding risk, as competing in the fast numbers of World Cup races involves a certain amount of risk. I thought I was okay with that, so it was painful, frustrating, and shocking to find that I couldn’t accept that risk after all.

and this was difficult. But it was even harder to experience that I couldn’t give one hundred percent on the day of the races. The reason for my retirement is a combination of these two factors.”

Fosslund concluded his post by saying that although he didn’t achieve all of his goals, he is grateful for the support of his fans and feels lucky to have traveled the world, met role models, found friends and skied legendary slopes while alpine skiing.

Markus Fossland mainly competed in the European Cup, he achieved two podium finishes in his 48 competitions, among them he won the super-giant slalom in Oppdal in February 2022. Since the 2021-22 season, he has started in several races (26 in total) in the World Cup series in Super-G and downhill, and only in December 2022, in the Val Gardena downhill, was he able to score points with his 27th place.

Related articles