5 minute read
Saya Sakakibara
CHASING SAYA
The going had to get tough for 21-year-old BMX superstar Saya Sakakibara to really get going. Here’s how her brother’s bike accident made her more mindful – and faster than ever
Words BEN SMITHURST
I
n January, 2020, BMX racer Saya Sakakibara was at a BMX track near her home in Helensburgh – 40km south of Sydney, Australia – with her brother, Kai. When we met up with the siblings there for an interview and photoshoot, they were among the top 10 BMX racers in the world and brimming with excitement in anticipation of the months ahead. The top goal, of course, was winning a medal in Tokyo.
But two months later the circumstances changed drastically. All events were postponed or cancelled and Kai, at 23, was fighting for his life after a sickening mid-race crash ruined his chances of riding his bike competitively – and, perhaps, ever again.
Not for the faint hearted
“BMX racing is a contact sport,” said Saya on that hot day in 2020 before tragedy hit. “It gets violent. Eight riders, everyone’s trying to win. It’s carnage.” Her brother added: “It does feel like a fight, especially in the first two-and-a-half seconds – it’s a battle to get to that bottom of the hill and in front of the person next to you.”
BMX racing: it’s not for the faint hearted. Pro BMX events are held on Motocross-style tracks, 300m-400m in length, over berms and whoops and jumps. Each race begins with the field jostling for position down an eight-metre entry ramp into their first jump, a 10-metre gap. Tangles are common: handlebars, elbows, knees. Launching skywards at 55kph, one rider’s pedal interlocked with an adjacent bike’s frame, results in spectacular crashes. Races are 30-second adrenaline hits. Mayhem is unavoidable;
Saya Sakakibara’s brother Kai crashed his BMX last year and suffered serious injuries
it’s part of the sport’s thrill. “But I think that’s the beauty of BMX,” said Saya. “There’s a lot of unknowns.”
BMX racing has been an official event since 2008, but Freestyle BMX will make its debut in Tokyo. “Introducing Freestyle into the Olympics is not a mistake at all,” said Saya, “but I feel like, if you have more knowledge of BMX, racing is still cooler.”
Born to a Japanese mother and British father, the Sakakibaras have always been about as different as two siblings could be, even if they’re both pro athletes. From the start, Saya was an overachiever. But Kai – older, fastidious and obsessive – was a committed over-analyser.
Sibling symbiosis
Saya and Kai’s relationship had its tensions. As in most sports, graduating to the elite division is a baptism of fire. Three years Saya’s senior, Kai reached the professional ranks before his sister. His was a typical story of rookie shock: clambering onto to the main stage only to be pole-axed by the big boys. He was slowly learning to compete on the big stage.
Elite-level rookie success seemed impossible at the time for Saya. “It wasn’t for me,” she said. But even though she was still a rookie at the time, Saya managed to claim Junior Elite BMX Supercross podium
places at her two World Cup appearances, finishing with four podiums in her first year. And she missed only two finals. Amazingly, in the final event of her rookie year, Saya scored first place. “I wouldn’t really say I was coasting, but I definitely didn’t expect it,” she said. “I definitely wasn’t, you know, going after it.”
According to Saya, her big brother was frustrated, irritated and even a little rude about Saya’s early success. “It
was just like, why does she train half as much as me, but is so good?” he said.
Kai had talent and a monster work ethic. Saya had incandescent talent, but a tendency to rest on her laurels. With the big event looming, though, they realised that they’d only be able to succeed if they figured out how to get the best out of each other. For example, Kai would introduce Saya to new routines, such as consuming protein powder supplements after training, while she would calm him down during contests when he felt tense.
Saya took Kai’s advice to heart. She trained and trained. She visualised and diarised. Slowly, things started to come together in 2019, and her performance level improved and became steadier with each event.
On her own
Then disaster struck. On a windy February 2020 day at a World Cup event in Bathurst, Australia, Kai went down heavily, his bike folding beneath him. Saya – who was awaiting her own race – saw him fall. A year after Kai’s crash, the recollection remains raw for Saya. “I knew it was bad,” she tells us over the phone. “I knew straightaway.”
After his crash, Kai was airlifted to an intensive care unit in Canberra with critical head injuries. He didn’t leave that hospital for two months. Kai’s recovery – what Saya calls his “new normal” – is painstaking. Re-learning to use his limbs, being able to speak and dealing with alienlooking equipment.
All through the pandemic, Saya trained alone – often literally. No coach, no teammates and, most crucially, no brother. When events called off, she decided to knuckle down. “Before,” she says now, “I was very much piggybacking off Kai. Just plodding along, doing what I needed to do. All these years I’ve grown up having an older brother and now it feels like those roles have changed and I don’t have that person to rely on anymore. I struggled with that – sometimes I still do.”
More ready than ever
By necessity, says Saya, she’s “kind of inherited Kai’s more intense characteristics” – being more independent and more self-driven, and keeping herself accountable for every aspect of her training schedule and her personal life. “Kai was motivating us as well as motivating himself,” she says. “But now I need to own it.” It was tough year for the athlete and blanking out her brother’s accident during training has proven understandably difficult. “I was worried about what would happen when I had my next crash,” she says. But that hasn’t happened yet. And for now, Saya considers herself ready to take on the challenge of representing Australia this summer – more ready than ever. “What I can say,” she says, ominously, “is that I’m definitely faster now than I was last year.”
