Browsing by Author "Hintikka, Teemu"

Goals. The purpose of this research is to graph, analyze and interpret the dual career of an athlete, specifically a synchronized skater. Additionally, the research delves deeper into a synchronized skater’s life in the context of an athletic and academic career. The research also maps out the support structures these athletes have in their dual-careers and the kinds of support they feel they’ll need in the future. The research focuses on undergraduate students, i.e., SM-level (National championship level) junior synchronized skaters. The given target demographic is chosen based on the lack of extensive research on the timing of a high-level athlete’s career-path in synchronized skating during undergraduate studies. Methods. The research was carried out through a qualitative interview survey. A total of 10 SM-level junior synchronized skaters participated in the interviews. They were chosen from, based on the results of the 2019-2020 season, the five best junior-level teams of the country. The athletes spoke of their own experiences relating to a dual career and the kinds of support they’ve received. The material was gathered through semi-structured thematic interviews from December to January of 2021-22. The interviews were transcribed and analyzed, the purpose of which was to summarize and conceptualize the interview material and add understanding to the theme of an athlete’s perspective on dual careers. Results and conclusions. The experiences of high-level Finnish synchronized skaters in a dual career are rather positive. A significant portion of the athletes felt that the combining of an academic and athletic career is possible and the two can even support each other in some areas. A high-level synchronized-skater appears to be a very performance-oriented and effective person. According to the research, the goals of an athlete were ambitious in both careers, but the athletic career was still overall the priority. This was seen especially in their studying speed: athletes often finishing their undergraduate studies in four years rather than the typical three. The athletes succeeded in their dual careers mainly due to their own persistence rather than their support structures surrounding them. There does exist support for their dual career, but for the support to be effective they require development. The athletes brought up many ideas for development of the support structures in place, mainly related to communication between actors, low-threshold support-services and asking about training times and places. Additional areas for improvements were identified as the oftentimes burdensome first year of undergraduate studies, morning-trainings in sports-oriented schools and supporting athletes who live on their own.