Despite the fact that The Tokyo Olympics is held in the context of the Covid-19 pandemic surrounding the world, the spirit of conquering the peak of the athletes is still at the high level, in which the most impressive one is probably Anna Kiesenhofe, PhD in mathematics, Austrian amateur cyclist who won the Gold Medal for women’s road race. Her success is beyond the imagination of her competitors on the same track.
“When there were 40km left, Anna broke through and let the former champions “breathe smoke”. The runner-up was Van Vleuten, a three-time world champion, even accidentally celebrating when she thought she was the first to cross the finish line, as she didn’t see anyone in front, and the others behind were too far away. However, it was Anna that finished the race first with a record of 3 hours 52 minutes 45 seconds, which is 1 minute 15 seconds ahead of Van Vleuten.” Vietnamnet newspaper wrote about her.
Anna\’s success is even more surprising to cycling fans when they learn that her main job is a researcher and professor of Mathematics at the University of Lausanne (Switzerland).
Among the list of Anna’s expertise, her forte is Mathematics, which has been well-trained, instead of cycling. Anna had pursued her passion for Mathematics at the Technical University of Vienna (Austria) as well as the University of Cambridge (UK), before receiving her PhD in Catalonia, (Spain) in 2016. Nevertheless, it is cycling that takes her to the top, becoming Olympic Tokyo 2020’s champion!
Obviously, the professional racers are excellent at their jobs, but they lost to the mathematician in the race because Anna used a distinguished strategic thinking to compete. Accordingly, there are 02 reasons for the spectacular victory of this mathematician. First, she is confident in the ability which is not the best of her; Second, she knows how to find distinguishing solutions to win the race.
Anna Kiesenhofe has used her mathematical expertise in racing and has built a capacity that surpasses her competitors. Before entering the race, Anna had spent time studying heat charts in Tokyo. She discovered that higher temperatures at the race venue can affect athletes coming from cold-weather countries like Switzerland. Immediately, Anna prepared herself a suitable training program to force herself to adapt to this temperature.
There is another reason, despite not the main one, it also contributed to the victory of the mathematician, which is that the professional cyclists were complacent, and they thought that she is just an amateur athlete, not a person who has the ability to compete for a medal with them.
Anna’s victory is a clear proof for the discoveries that have been analyzed profoundly in the book “Decoding East West Strategy”, which is that an organization or individual who wants to achieve outstanding results should not only do what they are good at.
There are always causes of weal and woe and the mystery of the paradox victory can be decoded. No matter if it is sports, business or life, the right path will lead to a bright future!
