It’s exactly a year now since Katja Stam suffered a back injury in Mexico that eventually kept her on the sidelines for six months. What began as a nagging pain on her lower back grew to a stubborn injury that saw her miss out on the majority of the 2025 season.
“It was everything and nothing at the same time. I don’t think I fully realized what had just happened. I was mostly in intense pain. At the same time, my mind was racing: Why now? What did I do wrong? Did I push too hard? And most of all where the hell is this insane pain coming from?” wondered Stam.
“Physically, the first month was the hardest. The pain was intense, I barely slept, and I couldn’t take care of myself. Even simple things like getting dressed were difficult. I didn’t know how far I would be able to walk each day, so I barely went anywhere.
“Mentally, at first, I was actually okay. I accepted the situation quite quickly and knew I wouldn’t be playing beach volleyball for a while. So I shifted my focus completely to recovery. First getting rid of the pain, and also, in a strange way, appreciating the slower pace after living in constant rush mode for almost ten years,” Stam painfully recollected.
The road to recovery was as slow as it was challenging; pushing the indefatigable Stam to her limits mentally. It almost felt like chasing a mirage until she finally made her return in late September alongside her long term partner Raïsa Schoon during the Beach Pro Tour Elite16 stop in Rio de Janiero.
“When I started training with a ball again in August, that became the hardest part mentally. I was back on the sand and I wanted to be 100% immediately but my body wasn’t ready. I had to find the balance between reintroducing movements and not pushing too far. That balance was incredibly difficult because I constantly questioned whether I was doing too much or too little,” revealed Stam.
“During the final phase, the doctors told me there was a possibility of persistent symptoms, but no one really knew what that would mean in practice. Still, I never truly feared I wouldn’t return. Every week I felt small improvements, and that progress kept me confident,” she added.
Raïsa Schoon (left) and Katja Stam of The Netherlands celebrate a point during the 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Adelaide, Australia.
Two other tournaments followed for Stam & Schoon; the Challenge event in Veracruz where they won gold and the Elite16 stop in Cape Town where they settled for silver. A wild card to the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championships came in November and they outdid themselves by reaching the Round of 16 to end what was a challenging year for Stam on a high!
“I actually see a lot of positive sides to that period. I wouldn’t choose it again but I also wouldn’t erase what it taught me. After five years of playing together, I don’t think a short break was necessarily a bad thing.
“I saw Raisa step into a different role with Mila (Konink) next to her, and that helped her grow in many ways. Watching from the outside gave me a new perspective on her development and on our team with (Coach) Lucas Palermo as well. It allowed me to appreciate what we’ve built together and also see clearly where we can still grow. The World Championships in Adelaide was such a special moment in my year, I was simply very grateful to compete again,” said Stam who was part of Coach Palermo’s coaching staff at the 2025 European Championships.
In retrospect, Stam believes the time out injured changed her perspective about professional sports. As an elite athlete, she has always worried about the next training, the next recovery session, the next tournament and repeated that year in, year out.
“An injury forces you to pause. It gives you space to reflect. And it makes you realize what truly matters, your health. It forced me to step outside of the life I had been living for ten years straight. For the first time, I really had the space to reflect on what I’ve been doing all this time.
Katja Stam (left) of The Netherlands in action during the 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Adelaide, Australia.
“It made me realize how special this life truly is. The privilege of traveling the world, doing what I love most, surrounded by incredible people. When you’re constantly competing, you rarely stop to think about how unique that actually is,” noted Stam.
“Suddenly, beach volleyball becomes less of a life-or-death matter. It’s still incredibly important to me, but it’s not everything. That perspective has helped me handle pressure and expectations in a healthier way,” she asserted.
More importantly, Stam has now learnt to be positive about failure. She understands that losing is an integral part of becoming the best of the best in the sport.
“I realized how much energy I waste worrying about things I can’t control. I’ve often been very strict and critical of myself and my results. Watching from the outside showed me that I wasn’t enjoying the journey enough and that everything can change in a split second.
“Now I’m kinder to myself. I know how much work I put in to become the best athlete I can be. I also accept that I can’t control the outcome. That has allowed me to fall in love with the sport and this life even more.
“I’ve learned to look at my career with more perspective and to be kinder to myself, I actually feel more confident. I’m enjoying the process more instead of constantly judging it. And I think that confidence creates even more fire during matches. It’s not driven by pressure anymore, but by belief.”
Katja Stam (left) of The Netherlands in action during the 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Adelaide, Australia.
Coincidentally, Stam & Schoon will play their first tournament of the 2026 season in Brazil just like last year. The Dutch pair will line up in the Elite16 event in João Pessoa, Brazil from 11 to 15 March. Stam, who barely took a break in December, feels she is back to her brilliant best and can’t wait to take to the sand courts of João Pessoa.
“In December, while my regular training group had time off, I trained with the youth group of Beach TeamNL. I had worked too hard during rehab to let that physical base drop again, so I wanted to maintain load and rhythm.
From January onward, we started training again with our own group and with Lucas and Andreas in The Hague. And now we’re in Rio de Janeiro preparing for the first Elite16 in João Pessoa.”
“It feels good to build consistently again. The injury made me much more aware of how I move and how I load my body. So technically, I’m paying more attention to efficiency. It’s less about doing more, and more about doing things smarter.
At the same time, because we didn’t have much time with Lucas and Andreas before I got injured, it now feels like we’re really building from the ground up. We’re not just adjusting details, we’re shaping how we want to play as a team.”
Stam’s long absence last year meant that their World Rankings took a hit. They will start the 2026 season at position 39 but for a pair that once stood at the top of the World Rankings, they certainly have what it takes to get back there. The 27-year-old reckons that they intend to take a different approach as they try to build a new identity on the Beach Pro Tour this season.
“I think the biggest change is that we’re becoming more specific. Technically and tactically we’re still developing, but the real step forward is mental consistency. If we can perform with the same clarity in important moments as we do in normal ones, we’ll move up naturally. We’re not looking for one big breakthrough. We’re building something stable,” begun Stam.
“We’re clearer about what we want our identity to be on court, how we want to handle pressure moments, how we want to communicate, how we want to respond when things aren’t going our way,” she shed more light on their approach.
Raïsa Schoon (left) and Katja Stam of The Netherlands celebrate a win during the 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Adelaide, Australia.
“Individually, I want to become more stable mentally. I want to compete with freedom not tension. To trust the work I’ve done and stay present during matches.
“As a team, our goal is to build a strong identity. A team that is hard to beat not just because of skills, but because of mentality. Consistent in level, clear in communication, and connected under pressure.Of course we want results. But our real focus is becoming a team that can handle the biggest moments,” she concluded.
Having played in three World Championships (2022,2023,2025), Stam is also eager to make it to her third Olympic Games when the 2028 edition is staged in Los Angeles. However, this time it won’t be purely about results but living the moment and experiencing what it truly means to be an Olympian.
“After the Olympics in Paris, I was disappointed with our result. But if I’m honest, I was even more disappointed that I didn’t truly enjoy being there. I tried to force myself to have fun, but deep down I was more tense and stressed than I expected and maybe more than I wanted to admit,” Stam reflected on her Paris 2024 experience.
“After a few tough months, I shifted my perspective. I started to see LA 2028 as a new opportunity. I don’t just want to go to another Olympics to improve the result. I want to improve my entire Olympic experience. On the hardest days of recovery, that vision was clear in my mind. The dream was set again,” revealed Stam who also took part in the delayed Tokyo 2020 edition with Schoon.
Katja Stam (left) of The Netherlands in action during the 2025 FIVB Beach Volleyball World Championship in Adelaide, Australia.
If 2025 brought out the fighter in Stam, 2026 and the years to follow will present a finer and calmer version of a warrior going all out to win every battle that comes her way.
“You’ll see a Katja who plays with more freedom. Still competitive, still ambitious, still wanting to win every single match. But less tense, more present. Someone who understands that this career is a privilege, someone who enjoys the fight. And someone who is not done yet!”
As part of our International Women’s Day 2026 celebration, we showcase player stories of resilience, discipline and evolution on and beyond the volleyball court from March 3 to 8.
