By dyingtoask
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Being bored at the Olympics is a good thing if you're Dr. Marcy Faustin.
Faustin is a co-head team physician for USA women's gymnastics. Paris will be her second Olympics.
The delayed Tokyo Games were her first Olympic experience. She thought protecting her athletes from COVID-19 and injury would be her main challenge.
Instead, she found herself thrust into one of the most seismic moments in sports when superstar Simone Biles had to withdraw from competition to take care of her mental health.
"What Simone was able to do is show that you need to take care of yourself first even if she feels the external pressure of the gymnastics community, the Olympics and the world needing her to be the face of the Games. It allowed other people to say, 'I'm not doing OK right now and I'm having a hard time,'" Faustin said.
"The Simone effect" rippled through the Games and the world, giving other athletes the freedom to admit the mental toll training and competing takes.
Protecting the mind is as important as protecting the body, according to Faustin. Athletes work with sports psychologists. The USOPC provides additional mental health help during the Games.
At USA Gymnastics, Faustin and Dr. Ellen Casey share the responsibility of taking care of the athletes and supporting personnel and their families. It's a holistic approach centered on making individuals feel safe, comforted and supported.
Faustin said, "Everyone who is a part of the team knows we have to do that physical aspect, but we also have to do that mental aspect. Whatever that is for that individual person."
Faustin is a former college athlete. Her primary job is working for UC Davis Sports Medicine in Sacramento taking care of non-Olympic patients and giving sports medicine lectures. Her love of sports and competitive nature make her a perfect medical ally and personal hype woman for Team USA.
Experience matters. And, it may be the U.S. men's water polo team's greatest asset heading into Paris.
Ten of the 13 guys on the roster competed on the Tokyo Olympic team, including three-time Olympian Alex Obert.
"There is a huge difference between your first Olympics and your second Olympics, the kind of nerves just knowing what you're going to go through every single day," Obert said.
Obert grew up in Loomis, California. He played for the University of the Pacific, the U.S. National Team, played overseas, and competed in two Olympics.
He retired after the Tokyo Olympics and took a finance job. Then came the call asking him if he'd come out of retirement for one more go at gold.
His wife and employer said go for it.
And, Obert made the cut, joining his third Olympic water polo team.
Obert says, "Even in retirement, I still had that itch to compete at the highest level. I didn't know if I was going to be able to make the comeback. But obviously I was able to make it enough to come back and help the team, and that's all I want to do is help the team compete and win."
Robyn Stevens walks faster than most people run and is on track to make her second Olympic Team.
Stevens is the fastest female race walker in the country.
Growing up in Vacaville, she said a high school track coach suggested she try race walking. Stevens did and instantly fell in love with the sport.
"It's super technical it's what drew me to it," Stevens said.
Women compete in the 20-kilometer distance in the Olympics. The sport relies on precision and power.
"With race walking, you have to land with one foot on the ground at all times. You have to land with [a] straight leg that stays straight until it passes beneath the hip," Stevens said.
Judges line the course watching for foot infractions and rely purely on what they see. There is no video review.
Athletes walk faster than most of us can run.
"In a 20k race, I'll average anywhere from a 7-minute to 7:15 a mile," Stevens said.
She contemplated retiring after the delayed Tokyo Games where she finished 33rd out of 58 competitors.
Two things kept her in the sport: One, she'd like her mom to see her compete at an Olympics in person. Fans weren't allowed at the Tokyo Olympics because of pandemic restrictions.
The second is that at age 41, she's still the fastest American race walker.
And that's despite having her 2023 training year disrupted severely by long-haul COVID-19 symptoms.
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From grit to glam. Women's Health is celebrating female athletes with its first-ever Olympics issue.
Liz Plosser is the editor-in-chief of Women's Health magazine.
The July-August issue is a global celebration of women's sports and athletes and spans 10 editions of the magazine worldwide.
"We really wanted to focus on women who would share their stories vulnerably, and let us into who they are as human beings, as advocates in their community, as moms as role models. In addition, they're sharing how they train and compete and perform at the top of their game," Liz said.
Women's Health drew on the colors of the Olympic rings for inspiration and then took the women out of the gym and into iconic settings for their photo shoots.
"We put them in a really epic-like superhero environment because they are superheroes to us," Liz said. "We also wanted to show them an action and reflect."
Olympic gold medalist Sydney McLaughlin- Levrone (track and field) is on the cover.
Six other athletes are featured in the issue including boxer Jajaira Gonzalez, breaker Sunny Choi, para-triathlete Hailey Danz, water polo goalie Ashleigh Johnson, pentathlete Jess Savner and rugby star Llona Maher.
All the women shared what they're doing to get their bodies and minds ready for the Paris Games. Several expressed the role mental health takes on an athlete's journey and share what makes them mentally tough.
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Keana Hunter spends most of her day upside down, trying to avoid getting kicked in the head while hiding from the sun. And she wouldn't have it any other way.
The 20-year-old first-time Olympian will represent Team USA at the Paris Olympics this summer.
Team USA hasn't qualified in the Olympic artistic team event since 2008. It last medaled in the sport formerly known as synchronized swimming with a bronze at the 2004 Athens Games.
Head coach Andrea Fuentes is getting a lot of credit for turning the team around. Fuentes is the most decorated artistic swimmer ever for Spain and won four Olympic medals.
Keana and her teammates relocated to Los Angeles for a year, putting their lives on hold to train for 10 hours a day, six days a week. Eight of those hours are in the water.
Artistic swimming is considered one of the toughest sports in the Olympics because of its blend of physical strength, flexibility, and performance.
"You're upside down in the water looking at your pattern and making sure you're in the right spot. But you're also traveling. So everything has to come together to make it like this beautiful routine. But there are so many pieces that like take hours and hours to fix," Keana said.
Coach Fuentes recently announced her Olympic roster of eight athletes. A squad of 12 swimmers qualified the U.S. for one of 10 Olympic spots but only eight athletes can compete in Paris.
Only one swimmer in the final eight has Olympic experience. The rest are first-time Olympians like Keana.
Katrina Young has unfinished business and she wants to get it done in Paris.
The two-time Olympic diver will compete in the U.S. Olympic Diving Trials in Knoxville, Tennessee, from June 17-23. She'll compete in both solo and synchronized events.
Katrina grew up in the Pacific Northwest, graduated from the University of Florida with a music degree in 2015 and competed at the 2016 Rio Olympics and the 2020 Tokyo Games. She didn't medal in either.
Her third Olympic push has focused heavily on mindset.
"You do have to go through this series of moments where the pressure feels very heavy. And I don't think that I've ever gotten into the zone at the Olympics where I've gotten through the pressure," says Katrina.
Going for a third Olympic team meant doing things differently.
The 32-year-old is a newlywed. She and her husband relocated to the West Coast.
Katrina moved to Los Angeles last year to train at the USC pool and pursue her other passion as a singer-songwriter. The change in scenery and shakeup in training are paying off.
Katrina says, "Shaking up where I live and my day-to-day routine has really opened my eyes to different sides of myself."
And, it's provided the elusive balance so many Olympians and the rest of us crave.
They say good things come in threes. Maggie Steffens hopes they come in fours.
Steffens is the team captain for the U.S. Olympic Women's Water Polo Team.
The team has won three straight Olympic gold medals. Winning a fourth would make history as no team, men's or women's, has won four straight gold medals.
We caught up with Steffens and her team at a sold-out exhibition game at Long Beach City College. The crowd was packed with female teenage club players.
"I was once that little girl on a pool deck looking up and seeing role models and saying, that's something I want to do," Steffens said.
Steffens' team is a team is a mix of veterans and first-time Olympians. She leads with an Olympic mindset grounded in gratitude with an eye on mentorship for the next generation of players.
Steffens says, "Going into this Olympics gratitude is one of my biggest things. How cool is it I get this opportunity and how can I make this torch a little brighter for the future of our sport?"
Coach Adam Krikorian says his team tries not to focus exclusively on winning gold again.
"The reality is this team has never won a gold medal. And we have people that have never been Olympians before. So this is their first experience," Krikorian says.
Bottom line: leadership and experience will matter greatly this summer in Paris.
35 years is a long time to wait for a dream. But Bill May says it's worth it.
Bill was 10 years old when he started artistic swimming. He fell in love with the sport and dreamed of going to the Olympics.
"Every time someone would tell me no, I'd say watch me. You're going to see me at the Olympic Games. You're going to tell me no and I'm going to say yes. They're going to say that person followed his dreams and there he is at the Olympic Games," says Bill.
The problem? Artistic swimming (formerly synchronized swimming) didn't allow men in Olympic competition.
Bill quit competitive swimming after watching his teammates win the 2004 Olympic bronze in Athens and put his aquatic talents to work in other ways.
He joined the cast of Cirque Du Soleil's "O" and spent 18 years touring with the production. But he never gave up advocating for men to be allowed to compete in his sport at the Olympics.
In 2022, the International Olympic Committee announced a rule change that allows up to two men per team in the artistic team competition starting this summer in Paris.
Bill says, "I think now that men are allowed, it's only going to open the doors for men to be in the sport and just from our families and people around the world to say, okay, this sport is inclusive."
This year, Bill was one of 12 Team USA swimmers to qualify for the Olympic team competition for the first time in 18 years. But only 8 swimmers can compete in Paris.
Head Coach Andrea Fuentes calls upcoming team cuts "heartbreaking." In this episode, you'll hear from Bill May and then Coach Fuentes on how committed she is to bringing a mixed team to the 2024 Summer Games.
A trip to Paris would be the ultimate revenge after getting dumped for Theo Brunner and Trevor Crabb.
Both are veteran beach volleyball players and both got dumped last year by their prior partners.
The timing couldn't have been worse.
Crabb says it often takes three to four years of playing with a partner to create the kind of chemistry it takes to qualify for the Olympics.
"We're one of the older teams on tour. I'm 34 he's 38 . We've been through the partner changes and stuff before," says Crabb.
That experience let them get to work while getting to know each other.
"As an elder statesman in the sport, I've seen good teams win tournaments who hate each other's guts and don't talk and teams that love each other that can't get it done. All that matters is scoring points," says Brunner.
The Paris Olympics will feature 24 teams, of each gender, playing under the Eifel Tower.
Team USA has already qualified two women's teams. Countries can qualify a maximum of two pairings per gender and so far no U.S. men's teams have met the qualification. The main qualification period ends on June 10.
The girls in the boat are heading to Paris and Folsom's Michelle Sechser has Lake Natoma to thank.
Sechser is a two-time Olympic rower in lightweight double sculls. She fell in love with the sport at age 14 after following her older sister to Capital Crew.
That rowing club is based at the Sacramento State Aquatic Center on Lake Natoma and has produced multiple Olympic champions.
"When I started at Capital Crew, never in a million years that I think I will be a two-time Olympian," Sechser said.
She started seriously pursuing the National Rowing Team after grad school and came in 5th at the Tokyo Olympics.
Lightweight sculls feature athletes much smaller than those found on the eight-person boats. That leads to races being won (or lost) in the blink of an eye.
At 37, Sechser is older than a lot of rowers. She'd already planned on Paris being her last Olympics. Then the International Olympic Committee announced her event would be dropped from the Olympic lineup after 2024.
Sechser predicts an epic final saying, "I know every girl on that starting line will be having the exact same thought, which is I've got nothing to lose, cause this is it. It's all or nothing."
The podcast currently has 280 episodes available.
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