Flow in snowboarding
Read an interesting interview with a young Rijeka Olympian.
Lea Jugovac qualified for the Winter Olympic Games, which are being held in February this year in Beijing, China. The sport in which she performs is snowboarding. Snowboarding is a recreational and competitive activity that involves descending a snow-covered slope while standing on a board, which is almost always attached to the driver’s feet.
Lea started skiing at an early age, and she enrolled in snowboarding school at the age of 13, in Platak. Progress, she says, has developed spontaneously.
She will perform in two scoring disciplines – Big Air and Slopestyle. Big Air is one big jump, in which tricks are done, while Slopestyle is a longer track consisting of several different jumps and several elements. She says she prefers Big Air, since she trained big jumps from the beginning.
Feeling is motivation
When asked what motivates her to perform big jumps, Lea says: The best feeling is when you do and drive a new trick, so I would say that this feeling motivates me the most for further training and competitions.
Flow is a state of affairs in which the athlete has a complete commitment to the game, focus and feels exceptional comfort. Pleasure is achieved when we have control, and gaining control over sports performance is never easy and requires a lot of sacrifice. This is how the Croatian Olympian says:
-As for performance, it depends on the snow park and the weather conditions. Sometimes a trail / snowpark suits you so you are more relaxed and comfortable than when you are in another snowpark, where you have a problem with a jump or an element. Also, there is an element of weather conditions. Sometimes it blows, it snows and temperatures are below zero. So unlike some sports where you have constant conditions and always the same “battlefield”, in snowboarding it is much harder to prepare mentally since you do not know what awaits you.
-So the most important thing is to focus and repeat in my head everything I need to do in the trick / rotation. Then I just get going. It’s not good to think too much either because then it can lead to fear and doubt, Lea says.
A key element to success in sports is dedication
When asked what success is for her, Lea answers:
-I would never necessarily link success to result. Throughout my career, I have experienced many competitions where a good result has happened, without being personally satisfied and knowing that I did not drive the best, and vice versa – that I drove well and gave my best, but the result was worse. It always feels a lot better when you drive well and have that personal satisfaction.
– We can connect successes and failures in sports with beautiful and ugly moments in life. Just as those moments shape us as we are on the sports side, so do successes and failures. I would even say that failures mean more and how you deal with them, how you keep trying and working even after failures. Everyone can look forward to success, but the right character is shown in bad moments / failures.
Dedication is considered to be the key element for success in sports.
-If you are not dedicated to the sport you play, I don’t think you can say that you play it professionally. Commitment, among other things, includes setting priorities and training, Lea said.
The prize for placement at the Winter Olympic Games will come in the spring, due to the epidemiological situation, in the form of socializing and celebrating with friends.
As for her performance at the Olympics, Lea concluded that she would really like to show her maximum and give her best, in a way that takes away her best tricks. There she would then have that personal satisfaction, and then the result as it passes.
