4. Interview with World Dragon Boat Champion Johnny Chou

1:31 - Johnny describes his career in this own words.

2:14 - Johnny describes what he does to move from the junior team, shooting for a high competitive goal and tries out directly to the national team.

4:22 - He describes a strong internal drive as being the key component that allowed him to make the national team.

6:52 - Johnny explains how coaches and mentors have played in his growth and how he passes this onto others.

8:25 - What advice would you give to a junior who’s looking to make the national team?

9:30 - Johnny explains his attitude to working through the pain of difficult training. He reveals how he works through the challenges of how training alone can be difficult but how he gets through this. Also, he lifts ridiculous amounts of weight.

12:50 - Johnny’s club team goes through some challenging times. The team goes downhill, and he explains the lessons he learned from these adversities.

18:45 - Johnny speaks honestly about how he, as a leader goes through a process to grow and mature. He takes the lessons from the difficult times into the way he handles emotion today.

22:53 - He tells us the story about his gold medal 1000m race, with only a few minutes of rest. It is a unique team pursuit with different divisions mixed in together, and the Canadian mens’ and womens’ teams end up in the same race. “It was a lot of pain to catch up to our ladies especially … they’re so strong … they’re ridiculously strong”

You can find Johnny at: @DragonboatJohnny - https://www.instagram.com/dragonboatjohnny/?hl=en