You are one of the few girls on the Tour to consistently land pushloops. Did you make it your mission to get this jump nailed?

It is a move I really like. It makes my adrenalin go so high. I wanted so much to learn it and I love jumping so it was easy for me. I first tried it at the Pozo event in 2006 but actually being consistent at them...that wasn’t until last year.

How did you overcome the fear of learning forwards/pushloops?

Learning forwards was harder for me. It’s the first jumping move and you have to be mentally ready for it. I tried to understand the move; how it worked, the rotation and as soon as I got the feeling I got it the second time I tried it. But it took me a long time to work out what was going on. But with the pushloop I didn’t try and understand – I just went up and looked back.

What are your windsurfing goals this year?

Well Cape Town has been more about wave riding as in Greece we don’t have the surf conditions. So I am trying to get more confidence in the waves and trying to surf better. In jumping I’m trying to learn the pushloop table top. I’ve landed some but I’m not so good yet. In freestyle I have to make myself train, it’s not so fun for me. But I’m trying to learn to flaka, I’ve landed some but I’m not so consistent yet for contests.

What’s the most scared you’ve been windsurfing?

This year in Big Bay, Cape Town in 4m waves. Last year I couldn’t even imagine going down-the-line in these size of waves but this year I did and it was really scary. I got washed a few times and it wasn’t nice.

Do you do any training off the water?

I go to the gym a little bit especially when I have a problem (injury etc). But in the summer when I’m sailing all the time I just do some stretching. In the winter I try to cycle a little bit and do exercises with those elastic ropes.

How do you see yourself winning a PWA wave event?

A contest where jumping counts more than wave riding I think I could do well at. I haven’t been doing that great at events – I have a lot of stress in the water. If something goes wrong at the beginning of my heat I kind of lose it. I need to work on this; stay relaxed and keep my heart rate down.

Being a woman on the PWA Tour – what is it like, do the guys help you or ignore you?!

I feel like I haven’t really fitted in yet as I still spend most of my time in Athens then just go to the competitions. At the events, everyone is stressed a little bit, trying to sleep well, not going out, staying focused etc. To really fit in you have to be training with these guys in the winter months. So I don’t have really any good friends yet, especially guys, but I think most of them are cool. I’m not getting any weird vibes, I don’t think they are putting me down or anything. It’s all good.

Could you give us an idea of how much it costs YOU to do the whole PWA Women’s Tour?

This year will be expensive. It’s hard to get the cheap flights from Greece like you can get from Germany or London. This year if I do all the events I’ve calculated the flights and the excess and it comes to 9000 euros to do the Tour (Tenerife, Gunicho, the Canaries, Brazil and Sylt). If you then add up entrance fees, accommodation, food it’s around 12,000 euros this year. It’s not so cheap eh?!

Tell us about the windsurfing conditions in Greece?

Greece has really strong wind so for me Pozo is a familiar place! In winter it’s mostly 3.3m weather or no wind. It is good for jumping because of the strong wind but it is onshore everywhere, you don’t get sideshore wind or surf. But we get a lot of days of wind – I think it is a good place to live in Europe.

Are there a lot of windsurfers in Greece?

In Greece, freestyle & waves are not recognised by any national organization so there is no background for kids to start in these disciplines, even slalom. It’s just the Olympic class which is organized. When Nicolas (Kaklamanakis) won the Olympic gold medal in 1996, a lot of people started to be aware of windsurfing but it didn’t last long. People started to windsurf but they didn’t take it much further. So we don’t have many sailors that train and travel. No one gets sponsored to be a windsurfing athlete in Greece. For me it was luck! Some of the guys are really good and do the EFPT events when they are in Greece but that’s it. No one gets money to go and do contests outside of Greece.

Finally, do you train with any other girls in Greece?

Not really, I am mostly around guys in Greece. My sister is quite good – she is really motivated and goes for it but we don’t really ‘train’ together. My boyfriend has taught me a lot and he’s my motivation for learning new stuff. He keeps pushing me to try more!