Thanks to Zoi Sadowski-Synnott's success at the Winter Olympics, we know more about the daredevil sport of snowboarding than ever before
By the age of eight, Zoi Sadowski-Synnott was heading up to the Cardrona ski field every day, before and after school, to train.
"I love how she comes across as just another girl, another young woman who loves what she's doing.
“She's having fun, but she's also incredibly driven," says Newsroom's LockerRoom editor Suzanne McFadden.
"She wants to win."
You can see it in the difference in her reactions to winning gold in the slopestyle at the Beijing Winter Olympics and silver in the big air.
"Gold blew her away. Silver was a tinge of disappointment," says McFadden.
"But that was only the fifth medal that New Zealand has ever won at a Winter Olympics."
Sadowski-Synnott has won three of those medals - she scored a bronze at the 2018 games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.
Today, The Detail looks at the ‘Zoi effect’ on snow sports in New Zealand and talks to McFadden about the 20-year-old Wānaka wonder, who she's followed for years.
With her recent success at both the Winter Olympics and the X Games in Aspen earlier this year, Sadowski-Synnott has proved she can take snowboarding to the next level, with her record-setting tricks.
Because snowboarding is progressing so quickly, McFadden says Sadowski-Synott and her coaches started working on new tricks as soon as the 2018 Winter Olympics were over.
She says they have to “almost look into a crystal ball four years ahead and go, ‘Okay, what will my rivals be doing in four years’ time? How far have they progressed?’."
After the 2018 Olympics, Snow Sport NZ got funding to build a dry slope that could be used for training year-round, but its construction was delayed by the pandemic.
Once it’s finished, Sadowski-Synott will be able to use it if she's in New Zealand over summer, rather than always having to head to the northern hemisphere.
McFadden says the pressure is on Snow Sports NZ to capitalise on Sadowski-Synott's achievements, to hook young children into skiing, skating or boarding.
The catch will be to keep the children interested until winter comes around. That could be tough with other big sporting events like the Women’s Cricket World coming up.
But McFadden expects Sadowski-Synott herself will be part of the drive when she returns home in March.
"She loves being around kids and it will come very naturally to her to spend time with them and inspire them without really having to do much other than just be there."
