Have you heard story about brother and sister Janica and Ivica Kostelić. When i was a kid they were my inspiration, i wanted to be a skier. I can't forget when my father took me and my brother on the Sljeme it is a mountain in Zagreb that was love on the first sight. I was dreaming about becoming skier.
I don't know if you watched movie about Janica and Ivica, name of the movie is 'Dnevnik pobjednika' engl, 'Winner diary' it is movie which tell whole story from their beginnings and to the end when Janica become ski legend, that woman won 4 gold Olimpic medals and 2 silver. She is absolute living legend.
Source: facebook
The movie is sad to me in the beginning because they didn't have enough money to pay ski tickets and skis , trips accommodation, so they slept in tent in the van. But they didn't have enough space in the van so their father slept outside, and one day they woke up he was burried with snow. They tgought he is dead.
If you remember Janica lose her glove at slalom in zagreb and she had driven whole race without glove and ski stick.
Source:youtube
If anyone tried skiing with speed of 40-50kmh smash sticks can imagine what pain it is,and after race she won 2 place. I think this really beautiful sport story. She won 5 gold medals in world championship and 3 season titles.
On the other hand Ivica was older brother bot did not have success as her in the beginning but, that man had 10 surgeries on his right knee, and after every surgery he was coming back stronger and stronger.
He won 4 silver medals in Olimpic games, gold silver and bronze medal in world championship. He was 2011 overall winner in ski cup and 2002 won small cristal globe in slalom 2012, 2013 small cristal in combined.
Source web
When you are reading this maybe this seems not a big deal to you but Croatia is very small country we have 4mil people, and the main domene is summer tourism, we don't have ski resorts, we have sljeme which have few small ski pists and not enough snow during whole winter, they didn't have money theY succeed only because of their strong will and spartan training.