Sport has accompanied me throughout my entire life and has given me so much: friends, passion, success, and great memories. But is it really possible to pursue a competitive sporting career while studying and preparing for a professional future?
For me, that question has shaped the last several years of my life.
Learning Early to Balance Sport and Studies
Shortly after my 19th birthday, I moved from my hometown of Bremen to Hamburg. However, the transition had already happened earlier. At the age of 16, I joined a higher-level hockey team in Hamburg, which meant commuting weekly while still in school. That was when I first learned what it means to balance school and elite sports.
Later, I started a dual study program at a battery company while studying Business Administration. During this time, I also began playing in Germany’s first field hockey league. Alongside university and work, I invested around 20 hours per week in my sport. On weekends, there was at least one league match, often combined with away trips to cities such as Cologne, Berlin, or Munich.
Very early on I understood the foundation of combining sport with work or university:
- time management,
- commitment
- performing under pressure
Organizing your time and knowing exactly when you can focus on a specific task is essential. My routine usually looked like this: after a normal workday, I stayed at the office to study for university or work on assignments. Afterwards, I went to training to practice with my team. I often used my vacation days either for training camps or to study for university or write my bachelor’s thesis. It was intense, but it shaped my mindset.
Continuing My Athletic Career While Studying a Master’s in Barcelona
My daily routine at EADA Business School Barcelona is quite similar - just in a new country and at a new level academically. As a Master’s student, I usually have classes in the morning, which allows me to use the afternoon to study before going to training.
Since August 2025, I have been playing for FC Barcelona Hockey maintaining a similar training workload to what I had in Germany. The Spanish league is organized similarly to Germany’s, with clubs from different cities across Spain. Fortunately, five additional clubs are based in and around Barcelona, which reduces travel time. When we have away games in cities like Madrid, Bilbao, Santander, or Gran Canaria, I often study on the bus or train to avoid falling behind academically.
A great advantage of being a student at EADA, is the open and direct communication with all professors, Administration Managers and Program Director. The time schedule is allowing me to pursue my Hockey career and if there is a scheduling conflict, I can talk to the people in charge and find a solution which suits everyone. The trimester’s are well organized and scheduled at least 3 months in advance. This enables me to schedule my training with my studies and plan everything in advance and point out scheduling conflicts, that I can start communicating early enough.
The Reality: Physical and Mental Pressure
It would be easy to say that everything always runs smoothly. The truth is more complex. When you combine high-performance sport with demanding academic studies, one area will sometimes suffer when priorities shift. There are evenings when friends meet for dinner or coffee, and I have training. There are weekends when others rest, and I travel for matches.The most important thing in these moments is to catch up and stay up to date.
The physical and also psychological strain is extremely high. There are moments when I question whether all the effort is worth it. Sport has taught me resilience. I learned how to work in teams, handle defeats and criticism, and celebrate success. One sentence has stayed with me: hard work always pays off.This is probably the biggest attitude I gained from my sports career. Whether you are close to losing or winning, overwhelmed by assignments or exhausted from training, you should always try to be the best version of yourself and work as hard as you can to achieve your goals. This mindset has helped me enormously in my professional career as well as in my current time as a master’s student.
Advice for Student-Athletes Considering a Master’s Degree
If you are an athlete considering pursuing a Master’s degree, you might wonder whether you will have to choose between sport and studies. In my opinion and what I experienced, the answer is No. Of course it takes a lot of energy to handle the double load and you will have some trade offs. But if you have good time management with advanced planning of your schedule, good communication skills and openness to all people involved and a strong mindset to achieve your goals, you can still handle it. For me it always helps to visualize the targets I want to reach in a certain period. Either on the sports field or at University. This will always reminds you why you are putting so much effort and time into your daily activities and makes you “hungry for success”.
In the EADA classes you will also learn many soft skills, which you may already experienced in your sports career and can keep on improving them with the professors for your business career.
And it is important to say that next to the studies and your sports, you can still enjoy your life as a student abroad. The City of Barcelona is the perfect location to enjoy your days off from studies and training. You’ll meet amazing people from all over the world and build strong connections. This will also help you to learn something new about yourself, adapt to different cultures and learn how to manage life in different surroundings.
Author
Maximilian Kloss
Participant - Master in International Management 2025-2026