The sounds of musicals blow like a distant echo through the foyer of the opera house on the Rhine.
The Bonn ensemble is rehearsing this year's summer piece in the great hall: “Chicago”.
It is about jazz music and shows, love and murder and is set in the "Roarin 'Twenties".
One stage further, the action begins exactly one hundred years later, it is less dramatic, but the situation is quite serious: In front of the red carpet, three saber fencers are on their way to their final battle.
Max Hartung, Benedikt Wagner and Richard Hübers want to fight again at the Olympics together with Matyas Szabo before they end their careers as saber fencers.
Achim Dreis
Sports editor.
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The German Fencing Association has invited to the Bonn Opera to bid farewell to its Olympic starters in the direction of Tokyo.
It's all about sport, no longer life and death, now that the corona pandemic seems to be somewhat under control.
Nevertheless, the event has a slightly theatrical touch.
Masks are worn.
So they are, the twenties of modern times.
A year and a half in stand-by mode
The sworn saber fencers from Dormagen had to stay in stand-by mode for a year and a half. Now the stage is finally set for them. But they step into the limelight without a dress rehearsal. The World Cup season has been canceled. Battles were almost only possible among themselves, without any exchange with the international elite. Shortly before the Olympics, nobody knows what their form will be like. "A bit strange", Max Hartung feels, "that it starts right away with the season highlight."
The 31-year-old Hartung is something like the main actor in the German saber team. He was twice European champion in individual, world and European champion with the team. In addition, he has caused a stir as an athletes spokesman beyond the planche. When the International Olympic Committee (IOC) delayed the decision on the Games last summer in view of the Corona crisis, Hartung was the first athlete to declare that he would not participate in Tokyo. It took the IOC a few days longer to come to the same decision. Olympia has been postponed.
Now, a year later, Hartung and his teammates set off for the Far East this Saturday: off to the last stand. It will be his final games after postponing the planned end of his career by a year. Wagner and Hübers also stop afterwards. Only Szabo wants to continue. His father is the national coach: Vilmos Szabo. The 56-year-old has a heavy heart when he thinks of the end of an era: “It will be very painful. We did everything together: training, competition, party. ”The group of saber fencers from Dormagen, who were all like sons to him, achieved many successes in recent years. Only the Olympics have so far lacked that little bit of luck.
They are betting on it now.
"When the light comes on on the planche," says Hartung, he hopes for another "good last competition".
He wanted to "do as many battles as possible".
Which would be synonymous with a good result, because it is fought in the knockout system.
Wagner, Szabo and him start right on the first day of the competition.
The battles begin on Saturday morning, and the winners are chosen in the evening.
One victory and the medal is tangible
Hartung was already there in London and Rio, finishing seventh and tenth. Not bad, but also not what he had secretly hoped for. “A lot of the things you were looking forward to at the Olympic Games won't happen in Tokyo,” he says now. Because of the contact restrictions, face-to-face meetings are excluded. It has its advantages too. The athlete can fully concentrate on his sport.
The second and greatest chance awaits on Wednesday, July 28th: the decision in the team competition. “We have a medal as our goal,” says Benedikt Wagner without further ado, and Max Hartung does not contradict. Only nine teams are allowed to fight. The Germans are in fourth place and start directly with the quarter-finals against Russia, number five. One victory and the medal is tangible. One defeat and all dreams are broken. "It can be over very quickly," says Hartung. But it doesn't have to be. In the training camp at the Hennef sports school, Vilmos Szabo gave his boys the finishing touches. “Basically we know what the Russians are doing,” says the national coach. But he didn't want to concentrate too much on: “We have to do our things” in order to be successful.
Until then, the sabers, all around 30, try to stay cool. They won't get camp fever, they have known each other too well and for too long. “We're all friends,” says Wagner and announces: “We'll be playing cards diligently” to bridge the gap. Or the "Settlers of Catan". Chicago the musical premieres on August 29th. The cut-off date for saber fencers has long been history. Coach Szabo is confident that it could be a thriller, but not a drama. Why is the story going to have a happy ending for his boys? "They have learned their lessons."