(Reuters) – Italian alpine skier Federica Brignone said on Tuesday she was against getting the COVID-19 vaccine but had it in order to make it easier to compete at the Feb. 4-20 Winter Olympics in Beijing.
Games organisers announced late last year that unvaccinated athletes bound for Beijing would have to quarantine for three weeks on arrival, while vaccinated athletes are free from this requirement.
“I’m vaccinated, although I’m against it. The Olympics are too important, so I have zero complaints. I want to go to China only to ski and try to win,” Brignone told Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera.
“(An Olympic win) is the big dream. I’m feeling good, I’m in good shape. Let’s hope to find the last pieces of the puzzle in China.”
The 31-year-old, who is top of the World Cup super-G standings this season, has 19 World Cup wins under her belt and claimed a bronze medal at the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang in the giant slalom.
Brignone, who is among medal favourites in Beijing, said that she had lost interest in the sport during a difficult spell in her career and used a mental coach and hypnosis to get back in the right frame of mind.
“In the last years I focused on this aspect (mental balance) to help Federica as an athlete but first of all as a person. A mental coach has helped me since 2015. Then I have also done hypnosis,” she said.
“I asked for help because mistakes are not a defeat but an opportunity to improve. Last year I was taking everything the wrong way, consuming energy for useless things. I missed out in a lot of competitions.”
(Reporting by Silvia Recchimuzzi in Gdansk; Editing by Toby Davis)
