Dahlqvist on tough season: "The body has not responded" "

Seven individual pallet places and a World Cup gold in team sprint became the last season for Borlängetjejen Maja Dahlqvist. Prior to this season, expectations of her were thus raised and she herself set a world cup victory.

But with just over a month left of the ski season, it can be stated that Dahlqvist's path has not really gone. She has mixed and given and it has only become an individual pallet place - the third place in Dresden. Admittedly, there have been two wins in the team sprint but otherwise it has been brave.

- I have felt that the body has not really responded as I wanted. It has not been disaster results all the time, but I feel I haven't got everything out, says Maja Dahlqvist.

- It has cost me more to do those little simple things this year.

She says she trained in much the same way as last year, which was a road win then.

- It was great to work out in the summer and in the fall, but then it was like it did not feel good from one day to another.

- I haven't really thought about why, and I try not to either. I have to take that after the season. Now I'm just trying to see what I can do today, tomorrow and forward.

Her coach Johan Granath, who has worked close to her for four years, believes it can be a combination of too much training and high expectations.

- Last year she was an underdog but this year she is more established and then more is expected of her. We saw this season as trying to take another step and therefore turned it up a bit with training and so on. So in hindsight it may have become a bit too much, he says.

Do you think she may have been training too hard?

- She may well have done that. She may have been a little too close to the border, then she has been training a little more at altitude this year.

Granath also thinks it can turn around once she gets weathered.

- Her turbo may not have been there, it hasn't really answered. But when it starts to respond, I think she will be terribly hungry. She is not that far from where she should be.

Maja Dahlqvist skips the Ski Tour which runs between 15 and 24 February. Instead, she goes down to Seefeld to be able to go on finer ski trails and gather strength for the end of the season.

- The shape is not far away, she says.