This is not how he wants to go out. Actually, paraclimber Michael Füchsle had wanted to end his competitive career this year at the latest. But the corona pandemic and health problems put a spoke in his wheel. “I have purulent fistula ducts on my intestines that can burst open again and again,” the 54-year-old from the small German town of Bobingen, south of Augsburg, tells me. “I couldn’t walk two meters because of the pain. Between March and June, I almost didn’t climb at all.”
Michael is thinking about whether he will compete again in 2022: “I’m still undecided, but if I do it will be the World Cup in Innsbruck on 21 and 22 June.” If Füchsle makes it back into the national paraclimbing squad, the German Alpine Club would cover the cost of his start. “If not, I would be stuck with it.”
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