Expressing intensity with "lo"
When talking about extreme sports or impressive feats, you often want to emphasize how spectacular or risky something is. To express this degree of intensity, Spanish uses a special structure: lo + adjective + que + conjugated verb.
| You know how spectacular surfing is. | Sabes lo espectacular que es el surf. |
This translates naturally to the English structure "how [adjective] [subject] is."
| It surprises me how risky it is to jump with the board. | Me sorprende lo arriesgado que es saltar con la tabla. |
| I hope you see how daring the jump was. | Ojalá veas lo atrevido que fue el salto. |
Emphasizing how actions are done
You can use the exact same formula to emphasize the intensity of an action. Just replace the adjective with an adverb (like velozmente, meaning "swiftly"). The structure becomes lo + adverb + que + conjugated verb.
| He noticed how swiftly you went down the wave. | Notó lo velozmente que bajaste la ola. |
| I would never forget how swiftly you opened the parachute. | Nunca olvidaría lo velozmente que abriste el paracaídas. |
Explaining causes with "por lo"
To explain that a reaction or result happened because of that intensity, simply place the preposition por in front of the phrase. This translates to "because of how..." or "due to how...".
| I felt a lot of adrenaline because of how spectacular the feat was. | Sentí mucha adrenalina por lo espectacular que fue la hazaña. |
| The athlete demonstrated his skill because of how risky the jump was. | El atleta demostró su destreza por lo arriesgado que era el salto. |
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