Kaya Turski hit the women’s freeskiing big time with her gold medal at the recent Winter X Games. We caught up with Kaya to find out about how her career brought her to this point and who has inspired her to success.
So, just how good was Winter X Games 14?
It was the craziest experience ever! Last year didn't go as I had planned – the weather was really bad and the competition didn't go as well as I would have liked. This year, I was very eager to redeem myself and my dreams came true. I was lucky to have competed on Thursday and gotten it over with, so I got to enjoy the rest of the weekend as a spectator.
You stopped skiing for a while to become a pro rollerblader – what made you go back to skiing?
Rollerblading was going very slowly, and I saw myself growing apart from it. I never lost the love, but at a certain point I was having a hard time keeping the motivation going with such a dying sport. My longtime sponsor, ski and rollerblade shop D-Structure, kind of got me into skiing again. Felix Rioux [legendary ski photographer and assistant team manager of French ski company Salomon] hooked me up with some Salomons, and the rest is history.
What’s been the biggest achievement in your career so far?
Filming with Level1, winning at X Games and getting on board with Red Bull!
'It took me a bit of time to see the light again, but I did!'
You were pretty badly injured before you switched back from rollerblading. How did you cope with that?
At first, it was very difficult to deal with, I won't deny it. I had the year of my life on skis and my season ended quickly with a bad internal injury. If that wasn't crappy enough, when I got back on skis after the longest nine months of my life, I had a knee injury. Really bad luck, I guess! That was definitely tough as well, and it took me a bit of time to see the light again, but I did! I guess what got me through it all was the fact that I knew I could never stop until I had done what I wanted to do and reached the goals I had intended to. There was no way that this was going to defeat me!
You said in a recent Twitter post that you dreamed you’d cut your own head off! Do you always have such weird dreams?
[Laughs.] No! I usually don't even remember my dreams. Maybe they're always weird and I'm just not remembering them, but, yeah, that was a really weird one!
Who’s the toughest competitor you’ve faced?
I don't know who the number one toughest competitor has been, but there are definitely a few ladies I feel keep me on my toes when in competition… Anna Segal, Sarah Burke, Grete [Eliassen], Michelle Parker…
You’re a particular fan of Sarah Burke’s, aren’t you?
I've always been a big fan of Sarah’s, yeah. She's good at whatever event she chooses to do and has basically paved the way for women freeskiers. Thank you, Sarah! One day I'd like to be an icon like she is.
How do you relax after an event?
I go and have a nice dinner, and then I hang out at my pad and sleep!
If someone made a Hollywood movie of your life, who would you want to play you?
Scarlett Johanssen, but only because we are sooo alike! [Laughs.]
What’s your favourite music at the moment?
Lil Wayne, Jay-Z… always.
For more from Kaya, go and hear her tweet at her twitter.com feed
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