From Prosport:

The retirement from a sport which brought her consecration means, a lot of the times, the end of a dream. A handful of wishes and moments in which the anthem is heard is all lost in a decision which can’t be escaped. A few, maybe the strongest, choose another road. Still in the training centre, still as a student, but in a discipline which has nothing to do with the past. Dana Druncea (20 years old) retired from gymnastics almost 2 years ago. A valuable team member, the sportswoman who won the bronze medal with the team at the World Championships in 2007, moved however, with new dreams and hopes for medals, to canoeing.

Dana Druncea seems unchanged. She is the same, short and serious, choosing carefully her words and smiling the same way as she did at Deva. She retired from gymnastics 2 years ago and never looked back. “Overall, injuries and the decisions from inside the team determined me to leave. Simply, I just felt this was best” , she explains. A hard decision, taken after 14 years of hard work in a sport in which brought her satisfactions, but also disappointments. A sorrow which only after a month started to catch another form. “On my first day at high school, the principal saw me that I was really short, he told me that I would be a good helmsman. I only knew that a helmsman stays in a canoe and screams”, says Dana laughing. It was the beginning of another dream, it was a new life.

For a year and 6 months, the canoeing family took the place of the gymnastics one. “The change was hard, however the wish of seeing my dreams coming true and to not give up on them made me take this decision. To rise up again and to go again on another road. I consider myself a strong person, I know that I can keep going no matter how hard it would be for me”, she explains. Dana speaks strongly, and her voice seems to shake every time she talks about the past. The words come out hard and she sketches pictures of the canoes, the first outing on the lake, the first meeting with the girls, whom during time became good friends with her. “My arrival in the canoeing team was a new thing for many people. Everything seemed different. Here, the training are different, the regime the same, not to mention the height of my colleagues. Among them, I am very small” explains ‘Pitic’, how she is called by her colleagues.

One for all and all for one

“I don’t do physical work, but I do go to practices because we are a team”

“The helmsman mustn’t be over 50kg, and Dana doesn’t have any problems with this. She doesn’t train, but she learns separately and she informs herself on the post she has on the team” , Mr. Constantinescu de coach completes her. The role of a helmsman is to cope more with the organisation for the team, which always must be the first priority. “It is very important to listen to what the coach and the team said, who are counting on you do fulfil your own responsibilities. You must always have a positive attitude, even when it is hard to do it.”

She confesses that since she has been on the team, she only went out a few times on the water and she still has a lot of things to learn: “I never imagined it would be this hard. When I was in gymnastics and I saw the girls on the canoe team on the small boats, sailing, I thought it would be quite easy, but now I can say it is one of the most hardest sports!”

“I want to learn this technique and to be the best, to get to the Olympics with the team, and to fight for the podium. If in gymnastics I didn’t have that change, I know that here I can fight for it”

“I am concentrating more often on the present and I am trying to everything better and better. Now, canoeing for me is the most important thing” – Dana Druncea

“In gymnastics I did everything how I knew it would be better and I worked as hard as I could, and this makes me feel more relaxed and to not have regrets for everything that has happened and for the decisions I took.”

Claudiu