Why is she in Indian wear? Is she getting married to shahruk khan or modi's son or some super rich business/politicians' scion ? (Happy new year everybody, wishing all you get whatever you wanted out of the badminton court in 2017)
Happie new year to u n everyone else. Yeah that was for the PBL ceremony. Looking forward to great action, the only excitement until AE and IND GPG
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...fe-is-carolina-marin/articleshow/56367922.cms Nobody can understand how tough my life is: Carolina Marin TNN | Jan 6, 2017, 09.34 AM IST HIGHLIGHTS Carolina Marin started playing badminton when she was eight years old She doesn't have a badminton icon, her sporting icon is Rafael Nadal The shuttle star from Spain has two World and an Olympic title to her name (TOI Photo) Carolina Marin looks possessed when on the court - lunging, diving, jumping and screaming as she dismantles her rivals. Off it, she is more like the girl next door - relaxed, friendly, sporting a smile that can light up a room. The shuttle star from Spain, who has two World and an Olympic title to her name, spent an hour in the TOI office as our Guest Sports Editor. She spoke with passion and conviction, breaking into laughter every now and then. She loves to be in control on the court but on Thursday she let her guard down and spoke about what makes her the badminton player to beat, and how she still craves for the simple things in life... Excerpts from an interview... You come from a country where badminton is not a mass sport. Tell us something about your journey as a player... I started playing badminton when I was eight years old. I was also learning flamenco (a popular dance form) then. I went to a badminton hall one day with a friend and I really liked what I saw. It was a bit of a strange sport in my country because we are used to watching tennis. I liked hitting the shuttle. When I was 12, I had to choose between flamenco and badminton. It was difficult because I had to also decide whether to seriously continue with my studies. When I turned 13, I went to national under-15 championships. My coach Fernando Rivas saw something in me there. He asked the federation officials to speak to my parents to let me play this sport. It was a hard decision for my parents, as they had decided to separate, but for me it was an opportunity which I had to take right at that moment. I left behind my family and friends back in Huelva and went to Madrid. I was 14 and now I have been there for the last 10 years. I simply could not have lost that chance. Had I delayed making a choice by a year or two, I would not be two-time World champion and the Olympic champion. Was there any conflict in your mind when you took that decision? It was definitely a risk. When I finished my high school in Madrid and it was time for me to go to university, I decided to give myself a period of three years to focus completely on badminton. It proved to be a good choice. Who is your badminton icon? I don't have a badminton icon. I know this will surprise you. My sporting icon is Rafael Nadal. We have the same character and personality when we are on court. We fight for every point. Even if we had to die on court till we win or lose, we will do it. Do you think Rafa can stage a comeback after going through so many injuries? Of course! When he played in the Olympics, he was actually injured. But he had made up his mind to stay with the Spanish contingent to enjoy the experience. When you are injured and yet choose to play, you are risking a lot of damage to your body. Sometimes, such risks may permanently affect your career. But Nadal is not a human being. He is more than that. Back home in Spain, he is a massive hero. Do you watch clips of his matches just to get fired up for your games? Yes. At times (laughs). What about football. Surely, you must be following football? I don't have time to follow football. When I get time to get on to social media, I follow it a little bit, but not too much. Since you live in Madrid, which team do you follow, Real or Atletico? I prefer Barcelona (laughs). My father supports Barca hence I support Barca. It must be tough staying in Madrid and supporting Barcelona? I had gone to see the El Clasico at the Camp Nou on an invitation. I went with my father. It was an amazing game. Yes, some of my fans support Real Madrid and some support Barca. When my fans who are Real supporters found out that I follow Barca, they tried to argue. I told them it's just football. Who is your favourite footballer? Messi is the best player in the world, but I like Iniesta. I like how he's such a good person off the field. I haven't yet got the chance to meet him, but I know he's an amazing person. I really like people who don't shout to get attention and are just normal. Is there any workout that you dislike. Can you give us a number for the crunches you do? Nobody can imagine how tough my training is. My team (coach, trainer, physiotherapist and mental coach) know of course. Maybe my family knows a bit too. But they cannot imagine how hard I train. They live in my hometown and I live in Madrid. I cannot tell you my training details though. Why? Is it all a secret? Of course (laughs). A secret is a secret. Tell us something about the way in which you prepared for the Olympics? The preparation for about two months before the Olympic Games was really crazy. I cried almost every day after training because it was really hard on my body. I can tell you that my coach said before or after the Olympics (I can't remember) that he wouldn't want this kind of training for his daughter or son. But when you really want something, you go out there and forget the pain. When I won the final against Sindhu, I jumped and cried. I remembered how hard I had worked for it, the sacrifices... I can do anything to achieve what I really want. Did you sleep well the night before the final? I couldn't sleep. Maybe an hour or maybe half-an-hour.
Can you talk about your diet? Did you have a cheat day after the Rio gold? At the Olympic village, there was an ice cream parlour. And a lot of players ate there. I couldn't believe it, as at that time they were in competition. So the day after I won, I ate one ice cream, but never during the time when my event was going on. My diet is generally not very strict. I know what I have to eat, chicken, protein, a bit of carbohydrates. I know exactly what I have to eat. Things like cake, ice cream are not part of the menu. You scream a lot during your matches. How did you pick up this habit? Do your opponents have problems with it? Screaming comes naturally to me. This is how I am, this is my character. This is how I feel confident about myself. Rafa is my idol and he too screams when he is playing. He does not scream so much now. Maybe some opponents are not comfortable about my screaming, but this is not my problem. This is their problem. Tell us about the kind of coverage you get in the Spanish media... I got a lot of attention from the media after I won my first World Championships. Everyone knows badminton is not very popular in Spain. But it is getting popular because now everyone wants to follow me. But we need to do more. Maybe we can show people that there is more to Spain than only football. Any superstitions you follow? (Laughs) I don't know if it is a superstition but I always take this (shows her locket around her neck) when I play games, just for the tournament, not when I am practising. Otherwise, it is routine stuff. Nothing like Rafa? He's different. He has so many superstitions. He puts his bottles like this and this, then if it is like this (demonstrates with hands), he is not comfortable (laughs). Can you tell us something about your locket? There's the letter C (for my name), the letter A, the first letter of my boyfriend Alejandro's name, and there's this face and the body which is very popular in my home. It's a present from my parents. Among the Indians, who would you say is a tougher rival, Saina or Sindhu? (Laughs) I cannot pick one because both are very tough. They are very different players. But I want to talk about everyone. I always tell myself that I am the toughest player to play. After the Rio Games, everyone asked me who would be my toughest rival and I always said 'myself '. Because I know when I concentrate and when I play my best badminton, I feel no one can beat me. In an interview, your coach Fernando Rivas said he had laid down certain rules for you... My life is really hard, nobody can understand how tough it is. For example, when I met my boyfriend, the first thing I told him was about my tough life because he has to understand. All of my friends, they too understand... I don't have too much time to be with them. I cannot go outside in the evening because I have to sleep early, I have to rest and be ready for training the next morning. These are the rules for my friends, my boyfriend and all the people who are around me. Does your boyfriend ever complain? (Laughs) Maybe yes, maybe no. But he understands everything. He supports me. Because he understands that I travel a lot. I have to train a lot. When I go back home I'm really tired and I just want to eat and go to sleep. If someone wants to become a part of my life, he has to understand all this. What time do you sleep and wake up? Wow, difficult question (laughs). I sleep at maybe 11, 11.30 pm because I finish my work at almost 9.30. Then I have to go home, prepare dinner, then eat and go to sleep. You prepare your own dinner? Yeah. When I was living at the national centre, I had everything - a room, food... I had nothing to do there, just train. But from October, I just trained there but I am living in with my boyfriend. I have to do everything myself. You know when you have a big change in your life, it's difficult. So you have to take time to be more comfortable about that. Before Rio, I was training three sessions per day. Now, it's just two. What are your hobbies? I really like to cook. I also like to go to the cinema, shopping. I also like to go to the mountains with my boyfriend and our dog Thorrie and forget about badminton. Rafa does not like dogs though? Really! I would like to have a house in the mountains with dogs and a horse. I really love horses but my coach does not want me to go horse riding. What do you like to cook? I don't cook paella because it takes too much time. But I can cook pasta, vegetable, rice, chicken, beef. Any special meal for your boyfriend? If I have time, I prepare moussaka. It takes three hours... You don't dance anymore? No. But when I go to my hometown, I dance just a little bit because I have forgotten almost everything. I would like to re-learn the steps but I don't have the time. But when I retire, I will try and learn the steps. Your coach has rules for friends in life but do you have rules for friends in badminton. Is Sindhu your friend now? Yeah we are very friendly, because I met Sindhu a long time ago when we played in the World junior championships. The problem in badminton is not many people speak English. With Sindhu, I have a really close relationship. In the PBL, how much of bonding is happening between players? Also, how different is it playing in a league as opposed to playing in a tournament? PBL is a great event organised by Badminton Association Of India and Sportzlive and we should have more of such events. It is a pleasure to be here, interact with everyone. Sometimes when we go for tournaments we don't talk with these players. We play a match and return to the hotel. In PBL, it is different. Does playing in PBL give other players a peek into your secrets? I don't give away my secrets but if I can, I help my teammates with suggestions while practising. Of course, they have to ask me. It is very difficult now because now I am training with men's singles players, which is very different from training with women's sin gles players. But I am happy being part of the Hyderabad Hunters team. We have a very good fighting spirit. Playing in a league is different from playing for yourself, because here you play for each other. It is important to keep in mind that you give your 200%. I always thank the crowd in Hyderabad. Without their support we couldn't have beaten Sindhu or Saina. The crowd helped us win the mixed doubles match. Carolina, there is lot of talk about the game shrinking from the 21-point format to an 11-point format. Your views... It is the first time that I am playing in this 11-point format. I like it. Before coming here, I had a long break. I was also injured, which I still am. So, a shorter game helps me give 100 per cent. It is also tricky because you have to play every point seriously from the start. You can't afford to trail even by two or three points because there is no time to recover at all. Would you like to retire when you are on top of your game? I am not thinking about retirement now because I would like to play for another eight years. I want to play at least two more Olympics. And as far as remaining at the top of game is concerned, lots of things need to be in place, like you need to be fit and your body should be able to take the pressure of playing at a high international standard. Who is your toughest rival now? Maybe Sindhu, because she is improving a lot, but you also have the Chinese players. They have always dominated and they always have a few good players. Talking about China, isn't it surprising that you had a Chinese coach in Spain but nothing much was happening. Once Fernando Rivas came in, things changed... It is not about Chinese alone. Now India too has some good players, then there is Korea, Japan. The main thing my coach said was that we need to change the way we train because if we do what the Chinese do then we will never be able to get past them. We have to think and act differently to improve and get ahead of others. How did the Chinese media react after you went there again for the China Open? I think they don't really like me because I broke the Chinese Wall and I defeated their top players. They couldn't take it that one Spanish girl has broken the Chinese Wall. Do you follow any other sport like NBA because Spain has a very good team in basketball? Do you follow Pau Gasol? Pau, yes, we met in the Olympic Village and we have been talking for a long time. We are good friends. When I got my first World title, he tweeted. Also Rafa Nadal, because one of my friends in the media told me Rafa always wants to know where I am playing. It is really surprising and flattering that my icon is following me and wants to know how I am doing. Can you talk about Sindhu's strengths and weaknesses? (Laughs) I cannot tell you. Sindhu will read the newspaper and change her strategy (laughs). What do you think about Saina? Will she come back strong? She's a really good and tough player. She has very good strokes. I think Saina can still get some good results. I think the top-10 in the world are all at the same level.
I am simply astonished at the ease of Marin to play at such a high pace. Not only that, but when her opponents (in the latest case Intanon) was panting after long rallies, Marin looks like she is going for a light jog. I have trouble believing that she is head and shoulders above all else in terms of fitness - are the other nations/teams that ignorant (in terms of training method) or other players so lazy or physiologically ungifted to match her level? Does she sleep in a hyperbaric chamber? Or something else? But all doubts aside, she had fantastic net touch during this match! Had I been Intanon's coach, I would have told her to net sparingly.
something wrong with her ankle in the first game while 15/11, made her slow down then lost. The third game, marin just couldn't finished it and Intanon had a great fight
It didn't look like a slight niggle was the cause of the loss, she was still moving pretty freely and her pace was high, her cross court smash was lethal. The usual mental robustness just vanished, Rivas was on his feet screaming at her to pull it together as he couldn't believe what he was seeing. She was 18-11 up g3 and she just lost complete control of the rallies and that frustration seeped into everything else. Her defensive clears were being over-hit so they were just soaring out of the court and Intanon was cutting the shuttle very sharply across the net to avoid kills and then moving Marin straight to the back of the court if she had an answer to it. She had complete control. I don't think the officials constant interference with her play helped her re-focus either and dictate the rallies as she did early on. Credit to Intanon for hunting her down in g3 though, she looked unplayable. Marin is a very tough cookie though so no doubt she will bounce back from this loss with ease. She didn't play poorly, I think there was just some overwhelming mental doubts setting it when she couldn't close the game as she planned. Not a bad loss but it could have been avoided.
Yeah, she practically imploded mentally from 18/11 up in that decider set to give away 10 straight points. Even though RI had incredible defence to gain a few points, I think I counted around 6-7 points lost simply due to unforced errors, eg. hitting long, hitting into net, smashing wide.
