She subjected everything to her dream. The queen of spinning disciplines Petra Vlhová learned to drive at high speeds to achieve a historic triumph for Slovakia and win the World Cup. The twenty-five-year-old skier was drawn to life success by her enormous will and ability to work hard.
Twenty years ago, it didn’t look like a hunt for medals and glittering globes at all. Petra Vlhová’s parents had a snack bar at the ski slope in Jasná, and little Petra put on skirts before she got tangled under her parents’ feet, and her brother Boris, who was four years older, skied down the slope.
“They were such a separate unit. They skied, then had a hot dog and continued again. There could be no talk of any top sport, they just enjoyed it,” Igor Vlha recalled for the Slovak daily Sme dad.
When choosing the rings, the ski one was a clear choice, from there the way to the ski club led to the first races. All with great dedication and sacrifice from the family.
“I finished after the students, I no longer went to the juniors. We decided to invest in Péta’s skiing career,” admitted his brother Boris Vlha.
However, her career could soon end on her home hill in Jasná. She was barely 11 years old when she had a serious accident during training and ended up in hospital.
“I collided on the ski slope with an older gentleman. I had a concussion, a sunken tongue and a jaw broken about five times,” said Vlhová.
Her father was standing at the Zahrádky ski slope at the time and saw the whole incident. “The gentleman had nothing to do there, he didn’t respond to the calls at all. Petra flew to the edge of the track and hit him while he was skiing. It was pretty serious. Seeing her on the ARO with all those hoses was a horror. I thought we were done. with skiing, “admitted Igor Vlha.
But it wasn’t the end of his daughter, she went back to skiing and wanted to train again. “I don’t remember much about the accident, but I know that I then had a wired mouth and I begged my parents to let me go skiing again,” the native of Liptovský Mikuláš laughed over time.
Her joy of grinding arches soon bore fruit, at the age of 15 she became the junior world champion in slalom and experts began to suspect that Veronika Velez-Zuzulová had a successor.
“I don’t think Petra would be the greatest talent in the world, but she is the greatest hard worker. She achieved all the success mainly thanks to hard work,” said Velez-Zuzulová.
The coach of Vlhová Ital Livio Magoni, with whom they started cooperating five years ago, knows about it. The year before, they came together for the title of world champion and now also for the big crystal globe.
“I am happy for the whole of Slovakia. Our common story is fulfilled, I have already experienced it with Tina Maze and Petra, it means a little more for me,” was the moved Italian coach.
And no wonder. As the head coach, Vlhová had to push into her head that her domain is not only rotating disciplines, but that she can achieve good results even in the speed ones. Thanks to this, she is now historically the first best skier in the world from Slovakia.
“I’m writing history, it means a lot to me. We left all the races, it was a difficult season and now I’m going to enjoy it,” Vlhová praised herself.
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