At this time last year, Lennard Kämna was struggling with a particular period in both his career and his life in general. Basically, he was trying to work out whether being a professional cyclist was really what he wanted to do with his life, or perhaps it was preferable to do something that would allow him to make a living with a little less self-sacrifice. And these uncertainties began to swirl around in his head just a few months after the year in which he established himself at the highest level: in 2020, Kämna had been one of the season’s revelations, with a stage win in the Tour of Dauphiné and then at the Tour de France.
Yet, in 2021, his head just clicked. He had a slow start of the season, his first race was the Volta a Catalunya at the end of March (where he still managed to win a stage), but then he stopped. He raced the Volta ao Algarve in early May and then decided he’d had enough. He didn’t race for the rest of 2021: he needed to find himself again.
“I felt that I lacked the opportunity to develop other interests – he explained in an interview with Weser-Kurier – With every unplanned event, the stress increased tremendously. I thought I had lived my life in the wrong way, I needed to open myself up to other experiences. It was difficult for me to get out of that tunnel”. Bora-Hansgrohe never failed to support him, and, in those difficult months, Lennard realised that cycling really was his life.
