The Big One
It has been a roller coaster couple of weeks / months. Lots of regattas sailed, including the Last Chance Regatta which officially stamped my ticket to the 2024 Olympic Games.
The Last Chance Regatta was interesting for me. Going in, I knew I was one of the stronger sailors in the fleet. This meant our strategy was far different than from a normal event. My goals were to play everything extremely safe and stay out of trouble. To secure my spot at the Olympics, I just had to be in the top 5 countries overall by the end of the week. I knew I had the skills and ability to do this without having to take any extraordinary risk.
Just as we planned, I played the week extremely safe. Even with this, I was able to be leading the regatta going into the final medal race day. Because of our medal race format, this meant that no matter what happened I was locked into the top 3 overall, meeting my goal to be in the top 5 countries. So before the medal races, I knew I was going to the Olympics.
This meant for the final medal races, I could just cruise and have fun without any real pressure since the job was already done. At the end, I finished 2nd which was slightly disappointing after having such a good performance all week, but its hard to complain when 2nd place gets you to the Olympic Games.
Since then, we put our heads down and have been in full work mode. This final stretch until the Olympics is the most crucial to work hard to ensure I am at my best for the big event. I have been in Marseille training hard since mid May with all of the top sailors. Additionally, Kiran Badloe (2021 Windsurfing Gold Medalist) agreed to work with me to optimize my preparation for the games. Nothing like having the most recent gold medalist on your team!
Without the help of everybody who has supported, I would not have been able to make it as far as I have. Thank you to every single person who has contributed in any way. You are the reason I am going to the 2024 Olympic Games.
All the best
Noah Lyons
Team USA | Paris 2024
