Steffen Tepel (born July 13, 1985 in Winterberg ) is a former German Nordic combined athlete and was assistant coach of the Swiss national team Nordic Combined from August 2011 to March 2013. He then took over as head coach for one season.
Career
Tepel made his international debut in FIS races and in the Alpine Cup in 2002. From January 2003 he also started in the B World Cup of Nordic Combined. At the Junior World Championships in 2005 in Rovaniemi , he won the gold medal with the team in the team. In the sprint he reached ninth and in Gundersen 17th place. After he made it onto the podium several times in the B World Cup, he made his debut in the Nordic Combined World Cup at the Team World Cup in Ruhpolding on January 3, 2007 . Together with his team-mates, he made it onto the podium with second place. After he reached the points several times in the individual World Cups , he ended the 2006/07 season in 47th place in the overall World Cup ranking. Nevertheless, he was still only part of the B squad and took part in competitions in the B World Cup and, from December 2008, in the Continental Cup. Two appearances in the World Cup in January 2009 brought 25th place as the best result and 68th place in the overall ranking of the World Cup with 6 points. At the Winter Universiade 2009 in Harbin , he won the gold medal in Gundersen. In the team competition, Tepel managed to win the silver medal together with Jens Kaufmann and Florian Schillinger . Also in January 2010 he started in two Gundersen competitions in the World Cup , but finished 36th in Schonach and 37th in Oberhof without points. At the Winter Universiade 2011 in Erzurum , at the end of his career, he once again achieved the silver medal in the Gundersen competition. He ended his career after the 2010/11 season and has been assistant coach in Switzerland since August 2011. Here he led the Alpine Cup and Conticup teams for 2 years until he became the Swiss head coach in Nordic combined in April 2013. He celebrated his greatest success so far as a young coach when his athlete Tim Hug achieved the first Swiss victory in the Nordic Combined World Cup since 1994 in January 2014. This qualified the team for the 2014 Winter Olympics .