The upcoming winter season will be a special one for the Italian team, as the World Championships will be held in Predazzo / Val di Fiemme. During the last year Evelyn Insam from Val Gardena established herself as most constant Italian jumper. Ladies-Skijumping.com editor Stefan Diaz talked to her.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: Evelyn, how are the preparations for the upcoming winter going?
Evelyn Insam: Everything is going very well. We did a lot of training recently, so I hope that this will be a good winter for me. The World Championships at home of course mean a lot of extra motivation and I am really looking forward to them.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: Two years ago in Oslo your team-mate Elena Runggaldier won the silver medal, but since she does not jump as strong and constant anymore. Will it be your job in Predazzo to win a medal for the Italian team?
Insam: My job and my goal it just to jump well, but for sure I will be happy if I will make a good result.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: The World Cup last year in Predazzo was attended by a large number of spectators. Until only a few years ago jumping competitions there, in contrast to cross-country races, were only sparsely visited. Can this increased popularity of ski jumping in Italy be merited to the female ski jumpers?
Insam: I don’t know exactly. But I hope that also we are responsible for this positive trend. It is just nice, when a lot of people watch a competition and even nicer when our families and friends are there.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: Does the additional motivation that you gain out of the presence of your family and friends make you jump better?
Insam: If it does, I’ll gladly take it in my stride. I see it as some kind of bonus.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: Do you have any particular goal for that winter season?
Insam: The World Championships at home are certainly the main focus of my attention. Of course it would be great to become World Champion, but actually everybody has this goal. Certainly it will be very tough to mix it at the top. But for sure I will try to do my very best.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: Well, let’s change the topic a little. The jumping suits got modified a lot after the last winter. Now, after tests in the summer a bit more space will be allowed again. How do you come to terms with this new suit design?
Insam: We did not try the new suits for the winter yet, but I guess that the additional space will make it a little easier again. In the beginning it was pretty hard with the new suits and adapting my technique to them took me a while.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: There is slightly more then one week until the World Cup will kick off in Lillehammer. What will you do until then? Just training or will there be also a chance to relax a little?
Insam: In general, I don’t have much time to relax next to school and training. We didn’t train as much last week. Now we are going to make our first jumps on snow and still need to make the last adjustments ahead of the competition in Lillehammer.
Ladies-Skijumping.com: I wish you a successful season. Thanks a lot for that nice interview!
Insam: Thank you! Ciao ciao!