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Gerek Meinhardtcould concludecareer with historicmedal
Gerek Meinhardt will lead the USA Men's Foil Team for one lastattempt to end a 56-year medal drought.
At the 2008 Beijing Olympics, Gerek Meinhardt became
the youngest ever athlete to compete on a U.S. Olympic
fencing team. He was 18 years old.
Eight years later, he is ready to leave the sport with a
JEFFREY SWINGER
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Fencing
Alexander Massialas
Gerek Meinhardt
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August 6, 2016 at 1:19pm CT
By:Eric Goodman
AlexanderMassialas
Age 22 |Birthdate 4/20/1994
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GerekMeinhardt
Age 26 |Birthdate 7/27/1990
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medal around his neck.
Meinhardt’s weapon of choice is foil. Traditionally, the
United States has struggled in this version of the sport,
where points are scored with just the tip of the blade
and target area is limited to the torso. No American
individual or team has ever won gold wielding a foil, and
the last medal of any color came over a half-century ago
at the Los Angeles Games in 1932.
The drought might end in Rio, and if you ask Meinhardt,
it will.
“We realistically have a really great chance at a medal,
which wasn’t necessarily the case before,” said the San
Francisco native in a recent interview with NBC Olympics.
“We’ll go in ranked second in the world and be one of the
favorites to compete for the gold medal.”
The “we” he refers to is the U.S. men’s foil team, which
includes Alexander Massialas, Miles Chamley-Watson and
alternate Race Imboden in addition to Meinhardt. Each
will compete in the individual men’s foil tournament,
with the exception of Imboden, but it’s in the team
tournament where the Americans feel they can make
history. “Even though you always go into it with a killer
mentality and a lot of confidence that you can defy the
odds, this time we actually have a really great chance.”
The team is coached by Greg Massialas, Alexander’s
father and a former three-time Olympian in his own
right. Massialas is the only coach that Gerek Meinhardt
has ever known.
“I actually had been taking piano lessons from Greg’s
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* ShareMeet Team USA: Fencing
Meet the athletes who will represent the red, white, and blue at the Rio OlympicGames.
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)
wife, Vivian, before I even started fencing," he said. "So I
would be at their house on Fridays for piano lessons.
Then afterward Alexander and I would go straight from
the piano lesson to the gym for practice.”
While Alexander and Gerek have only been Olympic
teammates once before – at the London Games – they
have trained together since they were five and nine years
old, respectively.
“It’s been a really great relationship so far,”
reflects Meinhardt. “We’ve been really fortunate over the
years that Alexander and I have been so successful, and
now he’s my Olympic teammate.”
Rio will be Meinhardt’s third and final Olympics. His
decision to retire after the Games is not due to age – he
only just turned 26 in July – but because he has a
promising business career ahead of him. He currently
works at Deloitte & Touche LLP's advisory
practice. "Basically I have two main clients in the Bay
Area and we help coordinate optimization with their
customers.”
“When I started I was a full-time employee, and that
would entail some days at four, five in the morning doing
a couple hours of workouts and then heading to the
office for the day, and then in the evening after work
heading to fencing practice.”
Working full-time while simultaneously training for the
Olympics is not unheard of, but it certainly presents a
time-management challenge that those who train full-
time don’t encounter. Since graduating and getting an
Story
* ShareU.S. fencer Alexander Massialas in line to make history inRio
Alexander Massialas has a shot at winning the U.S.'s first gold medal in indivdual foilfencing. His secret weapon? His father and coach, Ol...
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MBA from the University of Notre Dame in 2015, it is a
challenge Meinhardt has lived every day. After Rio, he will
finally dedicate all of his efforts to his professional life.
“I’m not sure how abrupt my retirement will be… but as
far as what I’m going to do afterward, I’m focused on my
business career.”
That’s for after the Olympics. This summer, Meinhardt
only has one thing on his mind: ending his fencing career
standing on the podium, ideally on the top step.
“I’m obviously looking forward to being able to see other
events and experience some of the Rio culture… but first
and foremost it’s the competitions. I’m hoping to go out
on top with a medal, and then I can appreciate
everything else that comes after that.”
Story
* ShareInternational Fencing Federation releases competitiondraws
The International Fencing Federation released the draws Thursday for the Rio Games.
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