“Now I really feel as though I got hit by a train,” Ivica Kostelić told Nacional on Sunday, January 13, only hours after winning the slalom at Wengen. We spoke in his hotel room after he completed all his protocol duties: he gave a series of interviews to worldwide television stations which had carried the race live, held a press conference and received his trophy. Even though the Wengen slalom is one of the most difficult in the World Cup circuit, likely due to the fact that this relatively inaccessible mountains lies in the heart of the Swiss Alps, and perhaps also due to the fact the no one else believed that Ivica’s success was not just a matter of luck, only reporters from Nacional and Sportske Novosti were there from Croatia, following Ivica’s second victory this season. This victory, after the one in Aspen where he wore start bib 64, and his second place finish in Adelboden, could be his greatest, since on Sunday Ivica skied with the flu and a temperature, and despite this, won both slalom races.

In this interview with Kostelić, he talks about the background behind his unexpected victories, why he doesn't want his guitar to become his trademark and admits for the first time that there is a special love in his lifeIt’s not over until I ski

The night before the slalom, in an informal discussion with members of Ivica’s team, trainer Vincencij Jovan, his technical assistant Ivica Franjko and manager Ozren Muller, there was no discussion of a possible victory. Everyone was in a great mood, optimistic, and they skillfully hid their concern over Ivica’s health, since he was already experiencing digestive problems and a fever over 38ºC. We only learned of his condition after he was leading after the first run. The small Croatian team was worried right up until his second run. As the winner in the first run, Ivica skied last in the second run. “What a feeling! To stand at the start, last. Just silence around you, no one around, the race almost over but not quite, not until I go,” said Ivica Kostelić lying in his bed after lunch, bundled up to his neck in a down quilt, while small beads of sweat were collecting on his forehead from his fever. Despite his flu, he spent over an hour talking to Nacional’s reporter, in the beginning he recalled for us the feeling he had at the moment he passed through the finish line and learned that he won again. “At the start I heard that Mitja Kunc’s time was 1:42:30, and when I saw that I had 1:42:29 and that I had won by a one-hundredth, that was wild. It was great.”

NACIONAL: Even though some are surprised, you’ve waited a long time for these moments of fame and glory.

It’s an amazing feeling. Every beginning is special and I’m sure that I will, whatever happens in my career, particularly remember this. But my first World Cup victory in Aspen is still my most special. I don’t know what happened to me then, it just clicked. But it didn’t happen in one day.

NACIONAL: Did you expect to win at Wengen?

No way, I’m sick and I thought I would give it my best, and it can’t be that bad since I’m in good shape. And, it happened. This second victory is really important because now different doors have been opened. There is an Arab phrase which says what happens once, will not necessarily happen again. But if it happens twice, then it will almost certainly happen a third time. That’s why the second win is so important.

NACIONAL: The press conference you held after your victory, where you were composed and open and talkative, gave an indication of your calmness and concentration at the starting gate. Is that so?

There is something in that. People approach communication in different ways. You have to be confident to be not only open but to also talk to people with conviction. I said today that I think the combination is underestimated, and I will always repeat that, if need be to the president of FIS, because, unfortunately it is true. And again, there are others, like Stenmark for example, who are concentrated in a different way, they have never been open with people, but they are just as settled. The only difference if that one is an aggressive calmness and the other is totally calm.

NACIONAL: You would call your calmness aggressive?

Yes, because totally calm are people like Janica. The difference is that total calm is a gift from God, while aggressiveness is learned.

NACIONAL: What do your psychological preparations consist of?

I don’t have any special psychological preparations. I just move from the point that you have to be aware that we humans have so much talent. That God gave us everything that he has except immortality, and we have to find the way to use those talents. Every health person can succeed if they set their goal, if they love what they do and if they believe in it. But of course, there has to be a certain dose of reality mixed in. I cannot dream that I’m become the Olympic champion in Nordic cross-country since that is not possible. But it is possible that I will become the Olympic champion in alpine skiing.

NACIONAL: Do you have any particular concentration technique before the race itself?

Some people always read the Bible, but I always read In Pursuit for Excellence. It has several concentrations techniques which vary from individual to individual. Some people think about being in a nice place with a loved one, while others like to be nervous. Today, the indifference I felt because of being sick really suited me. I was barely nervous at all. Otherwise, I try not to be nervous, and when I see that I am, and then I visualize someone I love. Today, before the second race, I went and sat down in the forest to calm down. I was sitting in the forest, not thinking about anything at all, I was just listening to the quiet around me, and the birds. And I tried to reduce the importance of the race in front of me. Because, really, no race is important in life. People assign importance themselves.

There are no, for example, totally catastrophic situations, there are only the ones we see to be totally catastrophic. We are anxious only when we think we’re anxious, when we listen to people who tell us that the ambitions of the public have grown. That’s ridiculous. As a competitor, you can let that pressure break you or you can achieve a state of mind where it doesn’t touch you because it doesn’t exist.

NACIONAL: Was it harder for you when you were fighting for your way to the top, or now, when, if to no one else, you want to justify what you have achieved to yourself?

I am only responsible to myself for my results, and only I can see my goals and know my expectations. I feel no pressure inside. There is no need for that, because life is huge, and there is no need to create pressure about whether I will win today or not. You have to stop, go into the forest and listen to the birds, because life goes on. At the moment I won today, someone was born somewhere in the world, someone’s grandfather died, and it’s not at all important that I won. The journey is important, it’s important to be proud of your journey. It’s not today’s victory that’s important, it’s all my victories to now.

It’s not hard without my family

NACIONAL: Are you aware of what’s going on as you ski, do you think of anything at all, or does everything just happen automatically?

For the most part, automatically, there is no real thinking, it’s that kind of sport.

NACIONAL: How well is your father informed about the details of your training during the World Cup?

Dad has always been a big part of our training. He comes up with the plan. In the field, that is mostly up to my coach, but 80% of it comes from my dad.

NACIONAL: Considering the role of your father on you, since you are such a strong person, how big is the role and authority of your coach?

When we are taking about technical skiing, he is certainly one of the best in the world and the worst is that that is underestimated. He is quiet, withdrawn. I love him a lot and we have an excellent relationship. We have known each other for a long time, and the fact that he called me up two years ago to coach me when I was injured means a lot to me. He believed in me that when others didn’t. He made a winner of me in the technical sense. He had good material to work with, but he receives the final credit.

NACIONAL: Is it hard for because you cannot share your success with your family, since they go with Janica to her races?

I don’t think about that. We have an excellent family, we are stable as a rock. My successes are the successes of my family, and theirs are also mine. It’s never hard for me because their not here. That’s the life and you learn to not think about it.

NACIONAL: Did you speak with your father today?

We spoke briefly. He told me I fight to fight this flu and that we would talk later.

NACIONAL: What did he say to you after your first victory at Aspen?

He said – congratulations, and I told him – no, congratulations to you.

NACIONAL: Many were very surprised at your modesty when you spoke about the winner of the combination and how that race is neglected before you spoke about your victory.

The majority of people here are either too shy or they don’t know English well enough to talk about the problems they have a right to talk about. That means that as a winner, I have the right to say something, and I hope that I will say many more things. Some things you have to fight for, and it’s normal that people who don’t have enough imagination, or don’t know English well enough or aren’t too intelligent, won’t be the ones to say so. They won’t support the combination, or for skiing for that matter, it means nothing to them that the skier who started in 63rd today finished 3rd. I know what that means, because I was recently in the same position, I wore bib number 64, and I won. I know how hard the combination is. I think that in the World Cup we need a winner who will openly talk about these problems. I think that journalists need to find out about them, and to spread the news. No one knows about Omoto, and today everyone is talking about me and celebrating my win. I am nothing compared to Omoto. He is the czar, and what he does, that’s skiing, since he skis all four disciplines. In slalom, we only do turns, in downhill, they fly straight. Combination – that’s skiing. Omoto is four times better than I am. He skis all four disciplines, yesterday he was fourth in the downhill, and seventh today in the slalom. I can’t do that, even in my wildest dreams. That’s why he’s the best skier in the World Cup.

My children will not be skiers

NACIONAL: Considering your bold way of supporting others and skiing in general, it would be good to have you as an Ambassador of Sport.

I wouldn’t like that. For as long as I’m getting good results in skiing, I will continue to fight for the interests of skiing, but I don’t want to be a special fighter for that.

NACIONAL: Today the reporters complimented you on having all the predispositions to study medicine, since you described for them in detail all of your injuries to date. Do you perhaps have such ambitions?

That was a little joke since I know a lot about the knee, I could have described the injuries in even more detail. But, you never know. Why not medicine?

NACIONAL: You mentioned that you though that the purse for the combination should be much higher than for slalom and the other individual disciplines. How big was the purse for Wengen?

Today I received a cheque for 24,000 Swiss Francs. But that’s no money in the sporting world. A baseball player can get up to $30 million in one year. Skiing is not a big sport and there is not as much money spinning around it, though some things should be regulated. The purse for slalom cannot be equal to or even higher than the one for the combination.

NACIONAL: If you had to weigh all your skiing sacrifices on one side, and all your satisfactions on the other – which would win?

I can tell you one thing, if I have a son, I will certainly not recommend skiing. I wouldn’t want to have to watch my kids break themselves and go through all those operations. Of the 30 contestants who skied the slalom today in the second run, 90% have already been operated, some several times. I don’t know a single skier who hasn’t been injured.

NACIONAL: Does that mean that skiing has become too dangerous, are we crossing the lines of human endurance as we strive for better results?

There have always been injuries in skiing and there always will be. I have often heard stupid comments by idiots who say that the sport is advancing. Advancing where? Man did not perfect himself in comparison to the advancing of the sport. People will never run the hundred meters in four seconds. We have our limits and until we evolve as a species we will not run the hundred meters in four seconds. We are close to our limits and wearing out fast, so its no surprise that things are breaking every so often. Before, people were going into the turns in the downhill at 100 km/hr and coming out of the turn at 90. Now they’re going in at 100 and coming out at 110. The material we have strapped to our feet enables us to do that, but I think that we need to make some limits in those materials, reduce the arches in the skis. It’s good that they have started to strictly control the equipment, and I am not in support of it being advanced much more.

But I know that the equipment will continue to advance and skiing the downhill, for example, relies heavily on the equipment. The materials will continue to improve, but man won’t and that will be an increasing problem. There are many other factors here as well, which no one will ever tell you. For example, that we should expand the groups to reduce the injuries.

Enjoying every moment

NACIONAL: Your life is made up of difficult training sessions, early bedtimes and wakeups, no going out, no friends or girlfriends. How do you cope with this lonely life?

At times, it really can be a lonely life. But if you like the path you’ve chosen, you walk down in and you’re not sorry. There are two paths in life and neither one leads nowhere, its just that one had heart in it and the other doesn’t. The only with heart gives you strength, the on without saps your energy. Meaning on the path with heart, you learn and life a point to your life, while on the other path you don’t find anything.

NACIONAL: Can you say that you’ve found the purpose in your life?

The purpose of life is the journey. I once read: Life is a journey, not a destination. We have to enjoy every minute of that journey. But man is such a creature that he doesn’t know how to enjoy it. For example, the people on Columbus’s ship had no idea of the role they were playing in history. It’s hard for us to appreciate what we’ve done at the moment we’ve done it. Or at that moment, when we feel something nice, to realize what it’s worth. We realize it a lot later, when we’re 60 years old. Man doesn’t know how to live in the moment. He always wants to go somewhere, he’s never satisfied. Today we’ve created these awesome technological inventions, computers, technological miracles, and in the end of it all, no one can sit at the edge of the bed and listen to themselves breathing. Real life has lost its importance. We’re all doing something, rushing somewhere; people don’t belong to themselves anymore. That’s the difference between appreciating your life or not, knowing whether or not you’re living in the moment. We live now, and not tomorrow, or yesterday.

NACIONAL: But you’re only 22 and you’re thinking of all these issues? What brought you to this level of awareness?

We learn at various levels, through beautiful experiences and through ugly ones. And the next time a trauma or a beautiful thing happens to you, you’ll know how to pull the lesson out of it based on your previous experiences. Every situation is a good one if you’ve learned something from it. It’s all the same if it was beautiful or ugly if you didn’t learn something. There is a beautiful prayer which says: Lord, give me the strength to change the things I can, the courage to face the things I can’t and the wisdom to know the difference.

NACIONAL: Today for the first time you publicly showed your trademark – a sticker of the ace of spades, is that because FIS forbade you from wearing it in the future?

Yes, they did, but I won’t, instead I will say any chance I get that that is a shame. That is not the logo of any company.

NACIONAL: What does that ace of spades mean to you, is it a good luck charm?

No, the spade is the weakest card, but it’s still the ace. It’s like some loser who’s an ace.

NACIONAL: Is that how you see yourself?

Yes, that’s my sign. Today they said that Mitja Kunc jumped in hell and came back. I was think, oh my friend, neither you nor I have been in hell, but I was certainly in a worse spot. That sign comes from the time when everyone neglected me. I kept saying that I would win Olympic gold. They just looked at me. And who would believe that I would win Olympic gold when I kept breaking apart?

NACIONAL: Do you blame yourself for your injuries?

No, that has only to do with the moment. It is impossible to be happy when you’re broken. But when you’ve been injured and you’re skiing again, and you win, when I look back, I can really be proud of myself. I had a very difficult path, but I succeeded. My former coach Marko Bošnjak would often say to me – many paths lead to the top of the mountain, but the view is always the same. I didn’t understand that at the time, but I do now. Someone is standing at the top of the mountain and they have no idea that there are more difficult paths to the top. What that view is worth to you is reciprocal to the path you took to get there. It’s not all the same if you got to the top by helicopter, or if you climbed up over the steepest cliffs.

NACIONAL: You are very open, does that take much courage?

I guess so. I think it only needs a lot of love. Everything else comes from that.

NACIONAL: You also need someone to give you love. Do you have a girlfriend?

I can say that I do. I have someone very special to me. That girl and I are on a great wavelength. But we won’t talk about that, that’s not for the media. I only wanted to say that you have to love what you do in life. There is no point to being persistent if you don’t like what you do. Love comes first, towards anything and anyone.

NACIONAL: Have you had time to draw recently?

Not really, the last drawings I made were some caricatures of the Americans attacking Afghanistan.

NACIONAL: It’s well known that you love to read a lot, what are you reading now?

I just finished reading Nietzsche’s Antichrist. Nietzsche was totally crazy, he’s great. I really like his darkest sentences. Within them, it is easy to recognize that he is his own person and he really said something powerful. For example, his sentence where he says when you look at the abyss for too long, then the abyss begins to look at you.

NACIONAL: How did you interpret that?

For example, when you think a lot about your failures or anything else, in the end, that thing will start thinking about you and will eat you up. It’s a concretely suicidal statement which says when you look too long, you start to like it. And you shouldn’t like it. And then you jump. But Nietzsche was so contradictory.

NACIONAL: Some people say that only simple-minded people never changes their point of view.

Nietzsche said it well – convictions are your prison. It’s true, that without your convictions, there would never be that movement which he saw in his mind. That there should be war and not peace. Because it’s convictions that create war, not a lack of convictions. Were there no convictions, we would all agree about everything, and there would be no war. That is the great contradiction with him. I respect people with strong convictions and people who stand for something, who believe in something, even if it’s wrong.

Guitar and band

NACIONAL: Your love for the guitar, which you revealed for the first time to Nacional, has become legendary since Adelboden. Last night when they drew numbers, they asked you to play, and I heard that among the other skiers there are also some great musicians and that you are thinking about performing together. Why wouldn’t a guitar become your trademark?

I was so happy in Adelboden that I had a feeling that I just had to do something. When I heard that the band was playing at the finish line, which is strange because they usually play outside the finishing area, I just jumped and grabbed the guitar. It was a gesture devoid of any self-promotion; I did it out of sheer bliss. It can’t be repeated now. What am I going to do, play the guitar for people? I came here to ski! My performance at Adelboden was a moment of inspiration, it happened by chance. I wouldn’t have played if I came in fifth or if I won with a second’s advantage. But when I made that mistake and crossed the line, I had a feeling that in some way I had to thank God and those people who were there. It was very special.

NACIONAL: Yesterday a singing manager asked me to present you with his offer. He is offering you the chance to form a band with the best Croatian musicians and to record an album. Would you accept?

I already have the best musicians on my team. I played at the gala ski party with Vedran Božić on guitar, Trooley on bass, and Fedor Boić on keyboards. But recording an album is a lot of work, and it requires a lot of time. And I don’t have time for that now, since I have to train, and besides training I have some other things in my life. The question is do I want to spend my energy on an album. It’s not true that I wouldn’t want to, but I’ll do that when it’s time and with the people that Trooley and I choose.

Vincencij Jovan – coach
In the last two years, Ivica Kostelić’s coach has been Vincencij Jovan, a Slovenian from Celje. A gymnastics professor and ski coach with a university degree, Jovan has been friends with Ivica’s father Ante for years, back to the days when Ante was handball coach in Celje. Then, Jovan trained Ivica as a boy. He is known as a good and systematic coach, which Ante Kostelić and the Croatian Skiing Federation recognized. Two years ago, Vedran Pavlek passed on all the duties of coaching Ivica on to him.

Ivica Franjko – technical assistant
Expert care of Ivica’s racing skis is handled by Ivica Franjko, professor of physical education and one of the eight demonstrators in the Croatian board of ski instructors and coaches. Those who know skiing know how important the man who handles and prepares the equipment is to the team of experts. Ivica Franjko has been on Ivica’s team since the 1998/1999 season.

Ozren Muller – spokesperson for the Croatian Skiing Association
Ozren Muller was a long time member of the skiing club Medveščak, where he trained Ivica from the ages of seven to nine. As a ski coach, he led the Croatian Ski Team to the Winter Olympics at Albertville in 1992. He is an economist and has been spokesperson for the CSA since 2000, since taking over public relations for Janica Kostelić, Ivica Kostelić and Nika Fleiss.