The canoeist Saul Craviotto It is synonymous with success, triumph, leadership, sportsmanship… there are no more adjectives for the most successful Spanish athlete in the history of the Olympic Games. He looks like a superhero, but a man who has left a nice reflection on pressure and expectations in a recent interview with Eurosport in which he reviews his success at the Paris 2024 Games.
With those six Olympic medals with which he surpassed David Cal this summer, Craviotto now reviews his feelings and experiences of these last Games and these are his words about what he had to fight against the fear generated by the expectations placed on his shoulders:
“I have to say that, at the pressure level, I have had a worse time in Paris than in Tokyo. And it is assumed that I had three more years of experience, a few more Games under my belt and that over time you learn to master some sensations… But pressure is a variable emotion and you don’t always handle it the same way,” said the paddler.
As an example, Craviotto gave his own example: “All that came to me was: ‘Craviotto is going to surpass David Cal, Craviotto the maximum Spanish Olympic medalist, K4 medal for sure…’ All those are stones in the backpack and they weigh a lot“It’s complicated to manage all that,” he said before telling how the passing of the years has made him change his perspective.
“I thought I knew everything already in London (2012) because I already had two Olympic medals, but in each cycle you learn new things. In these Paris Games I have learned a little to ignore the expectations of othersyou have to be comfortable with yourself, be 100% and, if you don’t achieve it, you take your hat off and congratulate whoever has won,” he added.
“If you listen too much to other people’s expectations… these are the Olympic Games, a competition where you play with four fingers. But I understand that in the pools everyone set expectations high and it was a bit ‘plof’, Although there are many Olympic diplomas, many fourth places… that for me is not a failure. The fact of having been there is already a success,” he concluded in a complete response to show it to all the athletes who are looking for their place in the elite.
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