Laughing into the sky – the late sports psychologist Jörg Wetzel leaves behind a great legacy

On Friday, a memorial service near Kerzers honored a man who shaped Swiss sport like few others, despite often working in the background. Jörg Wetzel – who died just two weeks ago while jogging at the age of 56 – made a name for himself as a leading sports psychologist. In this role, he supported the Swiss delegation at ten consecutive Olympic Games from 2006 to 2024.

Before his arrival, little attention had been paid to mental toughness in Swiss sports. In this respect, Switzerland seemed to lag far behind other nations, such as the USA. Wetzel countered this and made it socially acceptable for athletes to open up for the sake of their personal development, to delve deeply into their strengths and weaknesses, and to share their experiences with others. Although his influence is difficult to measure, it's a bold thesis: Without Wetzel, Switzerland would have fewer medals.

It's striking how much he achieved within the shooting sports association. Its athletes were long saddled with a reputation as failures and losers, which even triggered criticism from the Federal Council at the 2012 Olympic Games in London. With Wetzel's help, the turnaround came in part. He placed great emphasis on strengthening team spirit in individual sports; suddenly, the shooters could laugh together, they baked brioche together, and tensions were eased. In 2021 in Tokyo, Nina Christen first won bronze and then gold.

Between medal wins, she had fallen into a mental funk. She seemed no longer ready for the final event, in which she was considered the favorite. Wetzel, amused, provoked her by saying she could hand over her rifle and disappear through the back door onto the bus; he would make sure she could catch the next plane home. Christen laughed and said, "You're a wolf, I'll shoot, I'll think." The bronze medal was locked away in a safe – and Christen subsequently became the first Swiss Olympic shooting champion.

In 2024 in Paris, there was another gold medal in shooting, this time by Chiara Leone . And Wetzel said she became Olympic champion because she had developed a healthy distance from her goal. He encouraged Leone to combat her stage fright with humor so that she wouldn't take herself and the competition too seriously on the biggest stage possible.

Daniel Burger had once brought Wetzel to the Shooting Sports Association and became a close confidant. At competitions all over the world, they experienced incredible things together. They once encountered a 2.30-meter-tall judoka, and they said they felt like characters in the novel "Gulliver's Travels" – and drew energy from it. They approached the Tokyo Pandemic Games as if they were venturing to a space station in space; the athletes received a matching watch. They returned with precious metals. In his eulogy, Burger referred to Wetzel as his "fellow astronaut."

From a Swiss perspective, the Games in the Tokyo Corona bubble were exceptionally positive, and the subsequent Olympic expedition to Beijing, during which the athletes had to cope with even more restrictions, even became the most successful Winter Games ever.

Wetzel was able to empathize with the shooters. He had previously competed in the military pentathlon, was a multiple Swiss champion, and shooting was part of this sport. And because he came from this niche, he seemed to have a special feeling and motivation for athletes who rarely find themselves in the spotlight. Perhaps it's no coincidence that athletes from this category have recently achieved success at the Olympic Games.

As an athlete, Wetzel could be an extreme, ambitious man, a grenadier type. But he had little faith in rigid army drill. Rather, he took the stance that where an over-regulated, standardized culture prevails, lightness becomes difficult. He emphasized the subtle and was also a lateral thinker. Sure, he sometimes provoked controversy; when he advised athletes to be mindful of themselves, but didn't spare himself, despite health problems.

Swiss Olympic also had Wetzel on hand as an emergency psychologist, whose support would have been needed in the event of a life-threatening event such as an earthquake. While this never happened, Wetzel had to solve challenging tasks. For example, in 2010 in Whistler, when a Georgian luger was killed during training, the Swiss luge athletes subsequently had to overcome even more challenges on this high-speed track.

Wetzel worked with athletes on mindset, having them keep long-term diaries. This also focused on self-esteem and projecting strength. He helped a curling team, whose members were all overweight, lose a total of 80 kilograms. "You have to go through emotional hell to reach heaven," he once said.

Wetzel was convinced that mental strength had to be built like a muscle. He transformed negative thoughts into positive ones and even acted as a happy bear. Over the years, he moved away from traditional textbook methods like visualization and worked more with so-called hypnosystemic approaches that address the subconscious. He strove for flow states, because, according to Wetzel, the ideal is actually when an athlete doesn't think at all.

But you also have to learn to focus on something specific in order to regain your composure during a competition. In the "NZZ am Sonntag," he once described a mindfulness exercise with a thumbnail : "You look at it, touch it, notice how it feels. Do you feel any bulges or not? If my thumb is a trigger for calm and serenity for me, then I should use it."

He enjoyed confronting athletes with their backgrounds and their fears. As in the case of boxer Arnold Gjergjaj, he suffered from panic attacks. When he perceived a situation as stressful, nervousness blocked him, and he exhibited strange behavior patterns. This led him to stand beside himself in an important fight. Wetzel discovered that Gjergjaj, who had grown up during the Kosovo War, might have not yet processed a trauma. He recommended that Gjergjaj develop pride in how he and his family had overcome their fate. It was later said that this made the boxer more resilient.

Wetzel also coached top wrestlers and said of them in the "Berner Zeitung": "Like other athletes, they are insecure; the image they present to the outside world does not correspond to their inner selves. Many wrestlers react sensitively in and to stressful situations – even if they don't want to admit it." It was no coincidence, Wetzel advised Curdin Orlik , when he became the first "Bad Guy" to come out as gay in 2020.

Despite his successes, Wetzel had to fight for recognition. When a sports organization cut its budget, they were happy to cut back on mental training. He initially encountered skepticism in major team sports, such as when he introduced himself to SC Bern. Or when he tried to convince the sometimes tight-lipped YB coach Vladimir Petkovic.

Nevertheless, long-term and trusting partnerships developed with individual representatives of these teams, such as SCB goalkeeper Marco Bührer. He took on an enormous challenge as a young goalie, taking over from the iconic Renato Tosio, at a club considered a shark tank. Bührer ultimately celebrated four Swiss championship titles with SCB; he was the epitome of consistency.

Bührer says: "Pressure can be paralyzing. But Jörg managed to get me to love extreme situations." Bührer speaks of "mind control" and relaxing breathing exercises that he completed in the middle of a hectic match.

One of Wetzel's most important supporters was Ralph Stöckli, head of the Swiss Olympic Missions. He had already seen the psychologist as a curler, even during his heaviest defeat in the 2010 Olympic semifinals. Stöckli says: "Our team's world collapsed. Jörg made sure we didn't retreat into our shells and gave us back our joy. Two days later, we won bronze."

A Swiss Olympic delegation without Jörg Wetzel, is that even possible? Stöckli says: "He had decided some time ago that he wouldn't be there in 2026. But that was typical of Jörg: He carefully groomed a good successor."