The One
Now, Rivera is the one – the gold medalist in a sea of unimaginable younger expertise. She’ll be the veteran everyone seems to be seeking to carry the torch in the direction of LA2028 and can get her first probability this weekend in Louisville. Though the lure of a house Olympics is like no different, and the street is for certain to be crowded, Rivera needs to guide the brand new technology for Staff USA. She units little objectives on a regular basis, however isn’t afraid to share what her large objectives are for the following quad.
“Over the following 4 years, I want to make the 2025 Worlds and 2026, 2027, and, clearly, the 2028 Olympics,” Rivera stated. “I additionally actually wish to be the most effective on the earth, so I’m persevering with to work on that and simply to work onerous within the health club. I’d additionally wish to compete at Championships and presumably get first place, , simply win Championships.”
As Rivera’s 2025 plan is put in place, she continues to attract inspiration from her Olympic teammates who competed at a number of Olympic Video games effectively into their twenties. She is aware of that due to them, there are not any limits on her profession and what she will accomplish.
“It undoubtedly has impressed me as a result of now I’m extra motivated than ever to return to my second Olympics, which is totally insane to say,” she stated. “Simply wanting again and seeing these superb athletes go to a number of Olympic Video games and World Championships actually is pushing me, and I’m in a position to push my limits and see what I’m able to.”
She’s fast to call Nastia Liukin, Suni, Simone and Gabby Douglas as her greatest function fashions rising up, and is in awe and ever-appreciative of how a lot their accomplishments have elevated the game.
“Nastia, clearly, her mother and father coach me, however I’ve been wanting as much as her most likely since I used to be 6 years-old. I’m not even joking! I’d watch her actually each day simply compete, and I used to be like, ‘oh my gosh. I need be like her!’ I nonetheless look as much as her to at the present time. She’s one in all my greatest function mannequin fashions, my greatest motivation. I additionally look as much as Suni and Simone. Suni, I’ve gotten actually near her, and simply watching her prepare within the health club and compete actually simply opened my eyes, and she or he grew to become a good greater function mannequin than she was earlier than.
“And Gabby, she’s simply so humorous and so uplifting, and she or he simply provides me a lot confidence. Clearly, coaching together with her actually modified my perspective on gymnastics. She’s been by this as effectively twice, So I belief her.”
Oh, and that imaginative and prescient board? She nonetheless appears at it.
“I introduced it dwelling. I introduced it with me from New Jersey to Texas. It’s been in my room on a regular basis, and it’s at all times a reminder. I didn’t even understand it till after the Olympics. I got here again and checked out it and I used to be like, ‘I drew that’ and it really got here true.”
Pictures of 2024 Olympic Video games by Ricardo Bufolin for Inside Gymnastics journal
Pictures of the 2023 U.S. Championships and 2024 Olympic Trials by Lloyd Smith for Inside Gymnastics journal.
The complete cowl story on Hezly Rivera might be discovered within the February 2024 subject of Inside Gymnastics journal.
