Luuka Jones has really white teeth. I know this because she’s usually smiling. Some would say she has plenty of reasons to smile, not least because she already has her Olympic entry confirmed. Luuka’s result at the 2011 World Championships in Bratislava secured her the spot for New Zealand back in September.

Plus, despite being short of a slalom coach, Luuka is considerably faster since her last Olympics in 2008. ‘I guess I just changed my perspective on what hard training was,’ reflects Luuka. ‘I just wanted to get better hard out so I’ve just been training my arse off basically,’ she summarises in characteristic Kiwi fashion. This was aided by her collaboration with Jane Borren from Waiariki Academy of Sport. ‘It was the first major input I’d had… I increased my workload in the gym, starting getting proper training programs, and monitoring my training. I think that made a lot of difference.’

All the same, slalom is a very small discipline in New Zealand so sport specific coaching is hard to come by. ‘They’re sport scientists at the end of the day so it worries me a bit,’ says Luuka of the Waiariki team. ‘I’m always watching other paddlers and what they’re doing… I’m always looking at how to improve and I have to do it myself. I don’t have someone telling me how I can get better or someone on the bank so I have to be really conscious of how I do things.’

But it sounds like the main disadvantage is the effort of finding perpetual motivation. ‘Someone said to me the other day,’ comments Luuka, ‘you can’t underestimate the stress of having to think. And it’s so true.

Just waking up in the morning and going to training and having to set your own course and having to think about whether you’re going hard enough or whether you’re in the right zone.

Just having to always think: during training, after training, travelling, everything.’

Four years of motivating yourself and second-guessing your decisions takes its toll. Understandably, Luuka finds it hardest at races. ‘I get disappointed in myself really easily actually because when you don’t have a coach there you don’t have someone to say, ‘that was alright - we just need to work on this.’ [Instead] it’s like, ‘I’ve finished the race and I didn’t get the result I’d hoped. I have to go and analyse the video by myself and work it out. It’s hard.’

The mega-watt smile has faded a bit

‘Internally, I’ve run out of minerals. I’ve used all my minerals up training for the last three years getting to where I am now. I think I need to find something else to progress further, I think the coaching is what I need.’

Thanks to some funding, in six weeks time, coaching is exactly what Luuka’s going to get. In April, Luuka will fly to London to train at the Olympic venue and be coached by Andrew Raspin (a.k.a. Kidda). ‘It’s the longest period that I’ll ever have been coached and I’m so excited.’ She certainly sounds it: ‘I am so amped. You’re working with someone you trust and it’s more of a team effort, you’re not just out there on your own, you can work together.’

Advice and feedback don’t seem to be her main concern. She hasn’t mentioned video reviews or split timings. Luuka is well known in the slalom community for her outgoing and friendly manner so it makes sense that she seems most excited about having some company: ‘I just think having someone else to do it with, having someone who cares, who is at the river, who is basically in it with me…. I think that would help a lot.’

Of course, Luuka isn’t the only paddler to be in this lonely dilemma, and she won’t be the last, but that shouldn’t detract from how tough training alone can be. She’s got seven more weeks to go until Kidda can take over some of the thinking.

She just has to keep smiling until then. I think she can.