US Olympic sailing duo take advantage of postponement to train abroad

Olympic hopefuls get creative as they train amid a global pandemic. This includes an American sailing duo who have worked overseas.

It’s like a game of chess, except it happens at a fast pace on the water.

“You have to play ahead of the game all the time,” said Old Dominion University graduate Stephanie Roble. “There is a lot of strategy.

Roble and Maggie Shea make it up two women sailing team, sailing the 49erFX.

“It’s going really fast,” Shea said. “It’s just the two of us on board.

Shea and Roble have been sailing together since 2016, but they’ve known each other for some time.

“We’ve been racing together and against each other since we were 15,” Roble said.

They found out in February that they had qualified for the Tokyo Olympics, after winning back-to-back world championships. The postponement was actually good news.

Shea said: “We understood that the organizers were going to make a good decision for the safety and well-being of everyone and that there was a possibility that it would be canceled, so we were very relieved to hear. that it has just been postponed. “

As a “young team”, the postponement gives them more time to train together.

“As a gift that we have so much more time to work on these goals,” Shea said. “It comes with a lot of challenges, you know, financially support a campaign that’s a full year longer than expected.

In fact, they train in Europe. This is where their trainer and a large part of their competition are located. They spend an average of 200 days on the water each year and hope the time pays off when the games are played.

“It’s an honor and a privilege and I just hope to make everyone proud,” said Shea.

“I just think it’s absolutely amazing and I’m really excited to be able to represent Team USA,” said Roble.

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