It is 2024, which means we are heading into Summer Olympic season. The 2024 games in Paris don’t start until July, but Olympic trials have begun. Many Minnesotans are vying for a spot. One of the first trials underway is for U.S. sailing.

Right now, Shoreview native Lara Dallman-Weiss is in Miami, competing for a spot. MPR News’ Todd Melby spoke to Dallman-Weiss ahead of the trials about the sport and her hopes for the summer games.

This conversation has been edited for length and clarity. Use the audio player above to listen to the full conversation.

What kind of sailing are you doing and what kind of team are you on?

Dallman-Weiss: There are 10 different types of sailboats in the Olympics. I race one called The Mixed Dinghy, so it’s mixed gender, one male, one female. And this is actually the first time my type of boat has been mixed-gender. I’m racing with a teammate who has sailed in for the Olympics before, but it’s our first time sailing together. [It’s a] two-person boat. It has three sails, my teammate sits on the side of the boat and I’m on a trapeze. So I hang off the side of the boat.

It is so fun. It’s extremely physical and you’re working to your highest heart rate most of the 45-minute race and you’re also reading the wind making decisions based on the weather, and you’re competent. So you’re pretty much doing math problems while at your highest target for 45 minutes, twice a day.

You use the word trapeze. Could you describe what that looks like?

I have this harness that I wear and it has a hook around my pelvis section. And something on the side of the boat I grab and I hook on to that, so my feet are actually on the side of the boat and there’s a wire or a rope — you can use either — that goes up to the side of the mast.

It’s worth a Google search. It’s harder than I imagined to describe.

Sailors don’t want to give away what they might consider to be their secrets on their technique. Why aren’t you afraid of that?

I think each sailor and each team has different styles, different body shapes, different techniques.

So I’m more eager to show the sport and get that out there than I am worried about people seeing what equipment we use. I just really want to show everyone what the sport is like.

I think it’s so amazing, from so many different levels. There’s disabled sailing, which is amazing. There are a lot of veterans that come back and get into the sport of sailing; they have blind sailing racing. You can take it in so many different avenues.

There are boat deliveries around the world and everyone that I’ve shown sailing for the first time and been with them for their first sail, they’re just like: “This sport is something else.” And that really gets me excited.

Some might have the misperception that sailing is an elitist, rich sport. What’s your story?

I am rich in experiences. I am certainly privileged in that I was able to grow up sailing, but by no means do my parents pay for my sailing or my Olympic sailing. I very much had to fundraise and work side jobs and do anything I could to make this work.

I grew up sailing on White Bear Lake, sailing in the summers. And then lakes would freeze and I would play basketball and I was in track, cross-country and dance line. Sailing was just such a fun thing for me to do in the summers with my friends and learn how to race.

Then I went off to college in Florida and that’s when I really took it to the next level, started sailing on professional programs where you get paid to race and then got into the Olympics scene.

How many teams are competing in the trials and how many will make the U.S. Olympic team and go to Paris?

In The Mixed Dinghy that I sail, there are nine teams and one team goes. So it’s winner-takes-all.

Are you nervous about that?

I’m not, no. We have had so much preparation and we’ve done everything we can in our control. So now it’s enjoy and just take it one day at a time, one race at a time. And that’s kind of my motto that always gets me through.

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