World ParaVolley had a heart-t0-heart talk with Germany couple Alexander and Michelle Schiffler
Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, 10 November 2022 – Germany sitting volleyball’s power couple Alexander and Michelle Schiffler – from players representing different countries to the duos who fell for each other when they met on the court – proof that love and sitting volleyball do mix.
World ParaVolley talked to the pair at the 2022 Sitting Volleyball World Championships, the same event where they first met.
“I met Michelle in 2010 in the World Championships in Oklahoma. That’s when we first saw each other and that’s where it happened.” Alexander said.
“He made the first move, and then I had to look over and see who he was, and then I had to look at his credentials just to know his name, where he was from. It’s like a real fairy tale story. We were so infatuated and in love at the first moment. All I could think about was him. I immediately searched for him on Facebook,” said a blushing Michelle on recalling their first encounter with each other.
Michelle back then represented the United States, and the demands of training became more difficult, so she made the decision after the Rio Paralympics that it was time for her to retire and lead family life, and eventually representing Germany with a good support crew around her.
“It’s kind of interesting because after the birth of our first child, I sort of realised that I couldn’t do this overseas, back and forth with training. My first child was born in 2015 so I decided that Rio would be my last hurrah with the USA team. It was a great highlight winning gold,” Michelle explained.
“I had no plans of playing any more. I just wanted to stick with the German club team because Alex and I had just developed a new club in our hometown DSC-Dresden Sport Club. We wanted to keep pushing forth and recruiting players for that. It was around fall of 2018, while on vacation in Tenerife, watching the World Championships and thinking ‘Wow! We could have been there! But how?’.
“That seed started growing and flourishing into this idea that maybe I could play. I started training with the German team. There was a change in the coaching staff and Christoph (Herzog) took over and I thought that this looks very attractive. We have a young fellow sitting volleyball player-turned-coach. I thought this might be interesting.
“Around Christmas time of 2018, the girls were really pushing me to try…
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