Portrait Moritz Fürste - Part 2

FROM OLYMPIC HERO TO MANAGING DIRECTOR – PART 2

Continued – click here for part one.

Moritz Fürste is one of the most successful hockey players of all time. Today, the Hamburg native is successfully working on his own sporting venture – without ever having planned it.

Auctioned in India

This love is directed above all towards his home club, UHC, which remains a central part of his life to this day. In the meantime, he was lured by the Spanish league, where he played for Club de Campo Madrid, as well as the Hockey India League, which is held precisely during the winter break of the Spanish championship. “The main argument back then – and I’ve never made a secret of it – was that I saw it as a chance to actually earn a bit of money.” Unlike the German league, where salaries are more like expense allowances, in the fledgling Indian competition players are auctioned off to teams in a bidding process, with the winning bid representing their fee. At his third auction, the Kalinga Lancers secured the Hamburg native’s services for a record sum of 105,000 US dollars. Moritz watched the hammer fall at home with his wife Stephanie at half past five in the morning via livestream – and could scarcely believe his luck.

An early blow

The fact that such sums are peanuts for footballers doesn’t bother him: “I don’t have the energy for that; I’d just be getting worked up all day. I don’t like to dwell on trivialities that don’t benefit me. I often find that in everyday life; I’ve become jaded and pragmatic in many areas.” One reason for this trait is the early death of his father Peter, who introduced him to the sport of hockey and died in 1994 when the Baltic Sea ferry Estonia sank. Moritz was only nine years old. “Of course, it’s difficult to cope with such a tragedy at such a young age. What else is there to look forward to? Perhaps that’s the reason for my pragmatism and explains why I can’t get worked up about many things. It played a very formative role in shaping my character.”

Just a few days after the funeral, Moritz is back on the hockey pitch, scoring a decisive penalty; sport gives him a sense of stability during this difficult time. Just like the family bond: he has a close relationship with his mother Nicola, who now runs the hockey nursery at the UHC on Saturdays and romps around the pitch with Moritz’s older daughter Emma, whilst he meets up with old team-mates on the playground with his younger daughter Lotta. He also sees his brother Jonas, with whom he used to play, quite often. Naturally, the focus is on his “own little family. My daughters, my wife – that’s my life.”

Fitness revolution from Hamburg

Balancing family and work – that is the big challenge for Moritz following his sporting career. Since his departure from the international hockey stage, his strong hands have been holding pens rather than sticks in the offices by the harbour. Two years ago, with Upsolut Sports, he launched the Hyrox fitness competition, which is aimed primarily at the roughly twelve million gym-goers in Germany. Within five months, the team developed a fitness programme comprising eight workouts and eight running sessions. “We’ve created a competition that’s very simple to understand, that anyone can do, and, above all, carries absolutely no risk of injury.”

A total of 14 events are scheduled for the second season: alongside eight events in Germany and the showdown in Vienna, the aim is to make the leap across the pond to the USA for the first time: “The American market is a global leader, particularly when it comes to the fitness sector. What’s more, it’s simply a market with a volume of turnover that cannot be compared to Germany.” However, the Hyrox organisers aren’t the only ones to have spotted this potential: “It’s not as if they’ve all been waiting for us and are queuing up at our door.” Alongside 15 staff in Hamburg, five employees in the United States are therefore working to drive the fitness revolution forward in the land of opportunity. The goal is clearly defined: “We want to be the first trend to spill over from Germany into the US.”

Comeback? No, thanks

Despite his new daily routine, Moritz remains an athlete at heart; with around six months to go before the Tokyo Olympics, he’s itching to get back out there: “If you put me in there, I’d march right through the tournament!” But whenever he’s felt this urge to return to the pitch so far – “I’ve really thought to myself two, three, four, five times: “Oh fuck, you’d be absolutely raring for that right now!”” – the memory of all those training sessions and the sacrifice of free time and family always quickly followed. What’s more, his back is acting up again, his feet are shifting position with a crunch, and Moritz is now practically lying on the chair in the conference room.

There are only three exceptions when he leaves this relaxed position: when the conversation turns to the lost vote on the bid to host the 2024 Olympic Games, in which he was actively involved (“The Olympic Games are magical, Hamburg deserves them!”), a faulty fire alarm that leads to the evacuation of the entire office complex and Moritz frantically calling his friend, the co-owner of the adjacent Fischereihafen restaurant (“Say, is there a fire over there?”); and when, in the middle of a conversation, he receives the news that an Amazon parcel won’t be delivered (“I gave the old address, shit!”). Somehow it’s reassuring to know that even the pragmatist is occasionally roused from his reserve – even if it’s only by chance.