You probably didn’t notice, but some of you at least have been sharing lectures with one of the best young triathletes in the world. Of course it is easy to say that, but then it isn’t easy to finish tenth in the World Junior Championships — held recently in London — or to win German National Junior Champion- ships. It’s not so much a walk in the park as a brisk swim, cycle, and run, but St. Catz’ very own Sophia Saller has been making her mark on the world stage, and it was a massive privilege to ask her a few questions about her recent achievements.
We began, as you’d imagine, by chatting about her London success. Sophia talked of often feeling like “the lone one left training” in preparation for the event, but went on to say that “it is crazy how much motivation you get from being given the chance to race on a world stage in front of your friends and family!” I asked her about how she had mentally prepared for competing on such a big stage, and her response said much about how despite the fact that “there was no real pressure on me” she was a woman on something of a mission.
She said “It took a while to sink in that I would be racing ‘at home’ in my first World champs!” And went on to add that going into the race “I knew that I was in great shape and just wanted to go out there and do as well as I can, to make all the training worth it. The event itself was quite special to me — having volunteered at the Olympics there a year ago. So I was massively excited to race, but feeling “at home” and calm at the same time.
“The race itself was amazing, I often heard friends by the course cheering me on — despite the horrendous English weather!”
Of course being an Oxonian leaves little time to relax, but Saller was able to take a short holiday before coming up and she said that it “gave me the chance to just chill for a while before my “normal life” kicked in again.” To talk about this “normal life” finds Sophia at her most elo- quent; she said that “coming back to Oxford always brings me back to reality and makes sure that I don’t forget that you’re not going to get anywhere if you don’t work for it.”
For me the idea of getting up for lectures full stop is somewhat daunting, but Saller’s work ethic makes a mockery of mine as she tells me, on balancing training and studying, that “I do Maths – which means there’s no time I have to spend in a lab and I can work whenever I can/ need to. That might mean that I come back from training in the morning and sit on my desk and work while eating my breakfast — there’s a lot one can do in a day if the time is filled in efficiently.”
We then moved to discuss the idea of nationality. At the minute the issue is very topi-cal, with naturalisation debates wherever you look, but there was no such confusion in this case as Sophia was born and spent most of her childhood in Germany. She does talk of a great affection for Britain though.
“In my room at uni, I used to have a GB rug on the floor and a German flag on the wall – in Germany I’m called the Brit and here I’m the German. So I’ve given up on deciding which na- tion I should cheer for in sporting events and just go for both — which makes it slightly awkward sometimes when there is a Brit racing a German.”
I’d always wondered how one became involved with something as niche as triathlon, but Sophia’s answer made a lot of sense.
”I got slightly bored of just swimming up and down a pool (‘counting tiles’ as some people like to call it) so I tried out an Aquathlon (a swim followed by a run) and loved it. After a few more of them, I had qualified for the London Regional Team for the British Youth Triathlon Championships three years ago — never having ridden a bike before.”
However it’s not all about the elite level, as Saller makes clear how much she appreciates the Oxford sporting infrastructure, as “train- ing with people makes it easier to get up early and train in winter or run/cycle in the rain and cold.” While she was passionate about her cur- rent role as women’s captain of the triathlon club – “because I want to give some of the ex- perience and experiences I’ve gathered in Tri- athlon to other people and hope they enjoy the sport as much as I do!”
With an athlete as talented as Sophia who is clearly also so academically gifted , the temptation must be to slack off on the studying. Alas not, “I see University and getting my degree as a clear priority. I would have never allowed myself to dream of even starting at the World Championships two years later. I guess that is the excitement of it. The coming season will be a big step up for me — from Juniors to U23/Senior racing, which also means doubling distances. So my plan at the moment is to just see how everything goes. Although she mentioned that “even in that case I think I would get “bored” by just training, there would have to be some- thing that keeps my head occupied as well.
It is Sophia’s focus which sets her apart, but then, as she put it at the end of our interview, “I guess that’s what Oxford does to you.”
