BSS Summer Series featuring Lloyd Wallace

Over the coming weeks we catch up with our Team Athletes and Coaches to find out how they will be spending their summer. During this series we will cover injuries, rehab, training camps, new programmes and chasing winter in the Southern Hemisphere! 

This week we speak to British Aerial Skier Lloyd Wallace!

You have spent some time training in Switzerland this summer, how has it been?

Yes, I'm spending all summer out here, it's fantastic. I train with the Swiss team who have pretty much adopted me which is great. We train at a state of the art facility just outside of Zurich, it's a really unbelievable place with everything we need from our ramps into a huge swimming pool, trampolines, tumble tracks and diving boards. One of the trampolines is on top of three meter stilts meaning we can throw some huge air into the pool. Just a big playground really. 

How does training on the water jump help developed new skills ahead of the winter?

So we train new tricks on water in the summer mainly because it's much safer than on snow. The nature of the complex tricks we do means that when you first try a new trick there's a lot that could go wrong. A crash into a pool, that has a huge bubble machine underwater to break the surface tension, hurts a lot less than hitting hard on snow. Though it's hard to train the landing part of our jump, the more used to the flips and the twists we become, the better we will be able to adjust in winter. For every jump that we want to compete in winter, we have to qualify it on water in the summer. 

You’ve recently completed your second year at the University of Bath, how do you balance studying and training during the winter?

With a bit of difficultly to be honest. I've had to really step up and make sure I'm more organised at allocating enough time for each. It's so easy to get side tracked by one and let the other suffer. There have been a few long nights in airports finishing essays, but I've done pretty well this year. It will be a whole new ball game with having to write a dissertation next year, I'm sure I'll manage though.  If I need, I'm lucky enough to have the support of Sport England TASS and TeamBATH who I can rely on to help with organising my time. 

What advice can you give to any athletes looking to continue in education whilst pursuing their sporting career?

Routines, make sure you get yourself into a routine where you've set aside enough time for each and follow it. This helped me so much last semester. Make sure to put your training sessions early in the morning, it sounds horrible, but it really sets you up for the day ahead. It gets you out of bed if you aren't a morning person and you always feel more lively after, meaning it's easier to have a productive day after. Personally I don't have a problem with taking some down time now and then, but I know student athletes who never really relax. I think it's important to have a bit of time where you aren't thinking about training or work and you are just having a good time, it clears your head and, I find, you can focus better in your next training session. 

Follow what Lloyd is up to this summer here:

https://www.facebook.com/BritishAerialSkiing