How Miquel Travé finds his flow in the chaotic canoe slalom
An Interview with Miquel Travé By Ollimono Magazine | 12th September 2025
At 25, Miquel Travé has already stood on European podiums, raced an Olympic finals, and carved out a name in the unpredictable world of canoe slalom. Yet when you sit down with him, it’s not medals that come first. It’s gratitude, finding the flow state of mind, desire to keep learning and the little things that make up his life in La Seu d’Urgell, the town in Catalonia, that’s so dear to his heart.
“I never could imagine my life would be like this”
Miquel grew up in La Seu d’Urgell, a town that once hosted the 1992 Olympic canoe slalom event. “Thanks to this facility I could start paddling and be the athlete I am right now,” he says. His father, a former Olympic coach, was the one who nudged him into the sport. “He spent many hours on the river bank coaching me and my sister during the first three years of paddling. He gave me all the good base to start building the technique and feeling every good paddler needs.”
Even though his dad’s influence was strong, Miquel describes himself as a shy kid who simply loved being in the water. “I spent a lot of hours inside the water, enjoying and having fun, and I think that’s the key of the athlete and the results I got until now.”
“Canoe slalom is beautiful, but it can also be cruel”
Miquel frames every slalom run in terms of decisions and moments, not medals or applause. “There are infinite things that can change your destiny in every competition run. You can go from the top to the bottom of the results really quickly. At the same time, this is what makes it beautiful.”
That duality, the beauty and the cruelty, has shaped his career. He remembers the sting of missing out on finals in London 2023. “I was feeling ready to be there in the final, and a stupid mistake pushed me out. It took me many days to recover from that. Slowly I found my anger and transformed it to motivation for the future”. And yet, a year later, he stood fifth at the Paris 2024 Olympics. Just 1.1 seconds away from silver.
“It hurt a lot, being that close,” he admits, “but I wouldn’t say it was my worst experience. In the end, it helped me grow as an athlete.”
“If I think nothing during the run, it’s a very good thing”
From the outside, slalom looks chaotic. Gates flying past, whitewater exploding. But inside Miquel’s head? Silence. “My mind during the races is very calm, and the hardest and most important part is to keep this calmness inside. The best runs are when at the finish line I don’t remember exactly what I did in some places. That means I was 100% in the moment.”
“My body has been training for many many years so, after I have a plan, my body knows how to execute every move. If I don’t need to think about it, or my mind doesn’t interrupt, it means I’m in “flow”.”
This ability to find flow didn’t come without struggle. In 2019–2020, he admits he nearly lost it. “I had a mental breakdown due to not enjoying the water at all. I was training but not feeling like I wanted to. Luckily, after the lockdown break in 2020 I felt so strong and motivated again. The break helped me recover my mind and start again.”
“With confidence but without trusting yourself too much”
Some lessons stick, and for Miquel, this one never left: “With confidence but without trusting yourself too much”. It’s a balance he carries into his racing, his studies in audiovisuals, and even into everyday life.
Because despite being an Olympian, he talks a lot about ordinary things: football, video games, hiking in the mountains, furnishing the flat he recently bought. “Maybe it’s not that small, but moving in together with my girlfriend into the flat that I just bought as a 25-year old makes me so happy.”
“Training for growth, the gold will come”
When the conversation turns to medals, Miquel offers a perspective that feels wiser than his age. “If you train for the gold you’ll get frustrated very fast and many times. But if you train for growth, you’ll enjoy, you’ll improve, and if you grow in the right way, the gold will come.”
That mindset defines his future goals too. He’s aiming for the Los Angeles Olympics 2028, but is also looking forward to the 2027 World Championships in La Seu, a chance to compete at home, on the course that shaped him.
“I wouldn’t like to be remembered as someone not respectful”
For Miquel Travé, legacy isn’t about medals. “I wouldn’t like to be remembered as someone not respectful, not humble, and without sportsmanship. Out of the results, I think this is much more important. The young generations need someone to look up to.”
Role models matter to him. He looks up to Rafa Nadal’s mix of resilience and humility. “Once you listen to all that they (Toni Nadal and Rafa Nadal* – editor’s note) explain you understand why Rafa Nadal has been one of the best tennis players in history. He doesn’t let outside things get into his mind and make him lose stability.”
“A high-performance life means a life of sacrifices, discipline and perseverance”
When asked what high-performance means, Miquel Travé doesn’t romanticize it. “It means consistency, suffering, strong mentality, resilience, motivation, struggle, recovery. Some good and some bad things, and as a high-performance athlete you need to be able to make them all add up to your project and person.”
That blend of grit and balance comes through in how he talks. He is serious when he needs to be, but cheerful and grounded the rest of the time. A paddler who finds calm in the middle of chaos, and who seems just as proud of buying his first flat as of standing on a podium.
And maybe that’s the point. High performance is medals, yes, but it’s also life outside the gates.