But when the pandemic hit, all the training came to a screeching halt.
For Emily Regan, a Williamsville native who is vying for her second gold medal as part of the US Women’s Rowing Team, the pandemic has forced her to modify her training.
“I’ve been training non-stop for the last four years since (the 2016 Olympic Games in Rio),” Regan told WBEN. “Up until the end of February, I was training in California and we had our first selection event for the Tokyo Games. Then we got back to New Jersey at the beginning of March.”
Then the pandemic hit the US in a major way. Regan said “everything snowballed” for the first three weeks, including the cancelation of the World Cup races in Northern Italy.
“The most difficult part was the first week or few days that we were at home because at that point, the Olympics had not officially been postponed yet,” she said. “We had to train like we were about to be competing in four months at the Olympic Games.”
March 24: A virus rages, a flame goes out: Tokyo Games reset for 2021
The Olympic Games were rescheduled to July 23, 2021. The announcement came six days after the 2020 Summer Games were postponed.
“We were able to take a few weeks where we backed off on the training and just focus on our mental health and resetting to the situation that we’re currently facing,” she said. “That was really helpful because our coach said ‘Do what you want to do and don’t do any more or any less. Do what makes you happy.’.”
Now, she and her team are getting weekly training plan from their coaches.
Regan, 31, plans on returning home to Western New York to spend some time with her family before she continues further training. However, he plans to come home were paused as she wanted to give herself and others time to ensure they don’t have coronavirus.
“I’ve sacrificed a lot of family time over the last decade that I’ve been training,” she said. “To get a few extra weeks with my family will be nice for me. Over the next month or so, things should probably be heating up. The summers in New Jersey are really hot and humid and I think they’re much more pleasant and enjoyable back in Buffalo.”
She said the hope is to get back to full training with the team over the summer with a more fun component to it since there is no major event this summer.
But once the fall comes around, she thinks that’s when training will ramp up for the 2021 Tokyo Games. That training comes with the singular goal of earning another gold medal for the United States.