Perrine Laffont is flying to China this Wednesday, where she will compete in her third Olympic Games. Olympic champion in 2018, the skier from Monts-d’Olmes dreams of a new title. She confided before leaving.
Perrine, do you know what everyday life will look like in Beijing?
“We don’t really know, we’ll see on the spot. We just know that we’re going to be in a health bubble. It won’t be Games like in 2018 or 2014. We’ll have two days off to recover from the jet lag then four days of training before qualifying on February 3.”
With the fear of Covid…
“It’s borderline what is the most stressful. I’ve never had the Covid. There’s Covid everywhere at the moment. We really try to stay locked up, see as few people as possible and disinfect our hands every three seconds. We’ll have to be careful not to waste too much energy on that and become too paranoid. In France, we avoid people as if they had the plague when we go shopping. On site, I think it will be cooler, more relaxed because there will normally be people tested several times.
Unlike previous years, two girls are in great competition with you this season…
“They will be very big opponents. I will stay in my bubble. I will focus on myself. I will have to forget the others. I do not control what they are doing. We must not lose energy know what they’re doing. That’s the coaches job, not mine.”
“Sad that there is not my family”
The pressure is already mounting?
“We must not deceive ourselves. It will be a high pressure race. There will be stress, adrenaline. I know there is a lot of expectation around me. Don’t think it will be the easiest race of my career. You have to accept it and manage it in the best possible way.”
And the fact of being defending champion?
“I can’t remember how I was with Pyeongchang but it couldn’t be worse in terms of the pressure. I absolutely wanted a gold medal and not to wait four more years. There I didn’t no pressure to defend my title. I will remain Olympic champion for life. Nobody’s going to take that away from me.”
Games without an audience, what does that change?
“What makes me the saddest is that there is not my family at the bottom of the track. The other two Games I lived with my parents downstairs. After, the fact that there is no public at all, we are used to it.
You arrive in Beijing after two great World Cup weekends…
“Yes. It did good. It put the church back in the middle of the village. We had made mistakes in losing a little too much energy on the competition and on what was happening around. We had to cut with this around me, what is being said, the opponents… We didn’t understand my notes at the start of the season. In recent years, I put down my run, I had a margin. Now, this margin doesn’t The girls have joined me at my level. It’s weird but we had to accept it. It adds spice to the discipline. It’s not easy every day.”