Day 5: Foil à Deux - Lee Kiefer & Gerek Meinhardt
Update: 2024-07-31
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Description
Lee Kiefer and husband Gerek Meinhardt are both Paris Olympians. The fencers discuss keeping their muscles and their relationship balanced enough for Lee to have successfully defended a gold medal. Turns out, it requires a lot of spandex.
Listen to In the Village daily from the ground in Paris as host Elizabeth Beisel takes you into the most exclusive areas of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games to explore the daily life of athletes, complete with all the funny, mundane and unexpected things you learn off the field of play.
Follow the show on the iHeart app, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon Music or your favorite podcast platform. And watch and listen to every moment of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games July 26 – August 11 on NBC & Peacock, AND for the first time ever- on the iHeart app
Listen to In the Village daily from the ground in Paris as host Elizabeth Beisel takes you into the most exclusive areas of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games to explore the daily life of athletes, complete with all the funny, mundane and unexpected things you learn off the field of play.
Follow the show on the iHeart app, Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon Music or your favorite podcast platform. And watch and listen to every moment of the 2024 Paris Olympic Games July 26 – August 11 on NBC & Peacock, AND for the first time ever- on the iHeart app
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Transcript
00:00:00
If you could give me a level check, that would be great.
00:00:03
Leaky fur woman's spoiled goal.
00:00:07
Garrick Minehurst I'm Elizabeth Beisel, two-time Olympic medalist, and I'm jumping the press ropes to take you inside the Olympic Village.
00:00:15
Some of the most interesting and exclusive places of the 2024 Paraslumpic Games.
00:00:19
We'll talk to the athletes about pretty much anything and everything other than winning medals.
00:00:24
The quirky little details of daily Olympic life that only the athletes themselves know about, because it isn't all nail-biting pressure and medal ceremonies.
00:00:32
Okay, cool.
00:00:33
We'll get started in three, two, one.
00:00:40
I Heart Radio is the exclusive audio home of NBC's coverage of the 2024 Paraslumpics.
00:00:45
It's the only way to listen to exclusive NBC play-by-play action of the games, plus NBC's top Olympic moments and live hourly updates from Paris.
00:00:55
Bring the summer games with you everywhere you go.
00:00:58
Download the free iHAR app now and enable push notifications for live updates from Paris.
00:01:03
This is going to be the easiest one that you've ever had before.
00:01:08
Oh my gosh.
00:01:09
That's it.
00:01:10
Congratulations.
00:01:11
You're good.
00:01:13
So for you, Lee, it was an all-USA final yesterday.
00:01:18
Are you friends with Lauren?
00:01:20
Are you roommates with her?
00:01:21
Does it get awkward when you're coming in to each other?
00:01:24
No, I'm about 10 years older than Lauren.
00:01:27
So I have seen Lauren grow up and have all the success from a young age, as I was like literally in a different age category than her.
00:01:38
So it's been fun in that capacity and we get along, we're excited to fence team together so only goodbye.
00:01:46
That's awesome.
00:01:47
For you guys, in fencing, what is the normal age range?
00:01:51
Is there a certain point where you are kind of over the hill in your sport or is it something that you can just keep doing fencing forever?
00:01:59
It's a little bit of a moving target.
00:02:04
There might have been an athlete who's 15 and that's very young.
00:02:10
We were both 18 at our first games and honestly for most of our careers, we thought we had to retire and get a job mid-early 20s.
00:02:20
Here we are at 30 and 34, so it really just depends on how your body is folding up in if you're still enjoying it.
00:02:26
It's amazing.
00:02:27
And you guys met at the 2012 games.
00:02:29
Can you talk about the first time meeting each other?
00:02:32
What it was like?
00:02:33
Were you friends immediately?
00:02:35
So we actually, because we've both been on a lot of world team together, we've known each other since before the London games.
00:02:43
And we knew of each other, we weren't that close, but I think that year leading up to the games, our friendship really grew and we had more training camps and we realized all the similarities that we have and the shared interests and,
00:02:56
yeah.
00:02:57
Made sense?
00:02:58
Yeah.
00:02:59
Right time.
00:03:00
Right place, right person, made sense.
00:03:01
I love when the universe does that.
00:03:02
So when you guys did your outfitting, you both had like your own room with each other?
00:03:09
Is that like, did you know that was going to happen?
00:03:12
Was that unexpected?
00:03:13
They kind of surprised you with that.
00:03:15
It's a power move.
00:03:16
I like walk in there and like, hey, can we share a fitting room?
00:03:20
And they're like sure, okay, weirdos.
00:03:23
That was like your ass.
00:03:25
Yes, my demands.
00:03:27
Demand?
00:03:28
It's like the only perk.
00:03:29
I could possibly get beat.
00:03:30
Right.
00:03:31
Yeah, it's more it's more just convenience for her because she knows that like a clear and separate room.
00:03:36
So I'm going to be waiting for her to look at every single piece of clothing that I put on and, you know, trying to find out if it looks good or if I needed a precise, so just make sense.
00:03:46
And you're like, I'm saving the people time.
00:03:47
You know, I'm doing you all a favor.
00:03:49
Exactly.
00:03:50
I would love to talk about your kits that you compete in.
00:03:53
I'm definitely offending novice, so is there a kit that you specifically compete in versus one that you train in and are they heavy,
00:04:04
assuming it's hot?
00:04:05
Like, can you kind of go through the whole entire kit and the differences?
00:04:09
Yeah, so I do have a practice set and a competition set, mostly because I get so discussing my practice stuff, I'll sit on the floor,
00:04:19
I will it will just turn brown eventually.
00:04:23
But our competition stuff, we keep it beautifully, pristine white, only wash it on cold and hang dry.
00:04:29
So we look good on the big stage.
00:04:32
But when we sweat, especially like it just collects all that liquid and I think I weighed it after practice ones and it was like,
00:04:43
I don't know, eight pounds or something absurd.
00:04:48
Yeah, lots of electrolytes during practice.
00:04:51
We sweat a lot.
00:04:53
Typically we have air conditioned venues, so that helps, but we're just used to bringing multiple sets to the tournament and having to change partway through constantly changing t-shirts so you don't just like get super cold in between balance.
00:05:06
Right.
00:05:07
So we're underneath the set.
00:05:10
I usually bring hoping that all, being all day, four extra sets of t-shirts and spandex, no one wants to use infection,
00:05:22
being in wet spandex.
00:05:24
But yeah, that's just part of how we just stay fresh, just keep putting on new clothes.
00:05:29
Yeah, well there's one way to do it.
00:05:31
For your swords, I was able to interview some cyclists the other day and it was so cool hearing about how they traveled with their bikes.
00:05:40
So I'm curious, how do you travel with your swords?
00:05:43
Do you check it?
00:05:45
I'm assuming.
00:05:46
Yeah, we have these huge rolling fencing bags that look a little like golf bags and as you can imagine, we have to check the foils, but other than that,
00:05:56
they go through oversized and it typically isn't too bad.
00:06:03
We've seen some other sports where they like like pole vaulting and javelin, those things are really long.
00:06:09
Oh, I can only imagine that.
00:06:10
They're manageable.
00:06:11
Yeah.
00:06:12
How many foils are you bringing with you every trip?
00:06:16
Normally, I like to have five foils and a few extra blades, but we have seven foils because we were, we met business for the Olympics.
00:06:25
Yeah, I would say so.
00:06:26
That's probably good.
00:06:27
Better to have extra than not enough.
00:06:30
Awesome.
00:06:31
Wow, are they heavy?
00:06:32
How much is a foil in the sword like all together when you're fencing?
00:06:36
That is a great question.
00:06:37
I have no idea.
00:06:38
What's your estimate?
00:06:40
I have no idea.
00:06:42
They are, everyone I think is surprised by the fact that they are lighter than you would expect.
00:06:48
Okay.
00:06:49
Yeah.
00:06:50
Two to three pounds is my guess.
00:06:51
That's pretty light.
00:06:52
How long are they?
00:06:54
I have all the coins.
00:06:56
I want to know that you're like, I did this for it and honestly, I don't know.
00:07:00
Like, can you find out and get back to it?
00:07:02
Like, would you say as long as, like, how tall you are?
00:07:05
Like, I think it's three, five, four.
00:07:09
The length of my arm is the length of a floor, two short, maybe the length of your arm.
00:07:15
Okay.
00:07:16
All right.
00:07:17
So, like three feet.
00:07:18
I mean, yeah.
00:07:19
I mean, yeah.
00:07:20
So, does it hurt when you get pierced by a sword, like are you ever in pain?
00:07:27
So, you can get bruises, but it doesn't hurt, like, people think.
00:07:32
I would say the real risk of injury in our sport is just overuse, just all the repetition we do.
00:07:38
There's a lot of chronic injuries.
00:07:39
Yeah.
00:07:40
But it'll be uncomfortable.
00:07:41
Like, if I hit you, it'd be like, ooh, that's a little bit weird.
00:07:43
I wish I had it.
00:07:44
I wish you had it with me, so you could like, like, do it, maybe later.
00:07:49
Yeah.
00:07:50
Later, later.
00:07:51
To that point, you're saying there's so much repetition.
00:07:55
For either of you, ambidextrous, are you always right-handed, left-handed?
00:08:00
Because of that, are you then kind of like, well, I'll sign in in terms of muscles?
00:08:03
I would love to hear about, like, the physiology of the sport.
00:08:06
Yeah.
00:08:07
Neither of us is ambidextrous.
00:08:08
We're both right-handed, and at the Olympic level, especially people can only specialize in one hand.
00:08:16
We are, typically, in generalized vencers, asymmetrical.
00:08:20
And so, a lot of the work we do is with our strength and conditioning is to try and even that out just for performance but also injury prevention.
00:08:29
I'm so right-handed.
00:08:30
I can't even, like, hold this can of folk in my left hand, I'm so right-handed, like, it's not good.
00:08:35
Right, right.
00:08:36
That's wild.
00:08:37
So, you're constantly training to kind of even out your body.
00:08:41
Wow.
00:08:42
So, I was doing some research before this, and it says that a lot of the moves in fencing have derived from ballet.
00:08:48
Are you familiar with that?
00:08:50
No.
00:08:51
Because then I follow a question, and he said, "Yes, it's going to be how much ballet you do."
00:08:57
Oh, do.
00:08:58
Clearly not any.
00:08:59
So, what does like cross-training look like for you guys?
00:09:02
We have the same strength coach, we do a fair amount of lifting, a lot of it, some for strength, but a lot of just get our muscles protecting us when we do all of our repetition.
00:09:17
Some speed, working those small muscles, I don't know.
00:09:22
Yeah, I'd say most of it is strength and power, because as far as the cardio and the stamina we get that through our training, our fencing training sessions, so yeah, a lot of that,
00:09:32
like, lifting and then a salt bike, and for, like, short strengths.
00:09:37
Oh, we love an assault bike.
00:09:38
We have 10 calories.
00:09:39
It takes like 20 minutes.
00:09:40
Come on.
00:09:41
I'm almost there.
00:09:42
Yeah.
00:09:43
Do you guys, when you're training, do you ever train with each other?
00:09:46
All the time.
00:09:47
Yeah.
00:09:48
Oh, no way.
00:09:49
What is that like?
00:09:50
It's great.
00:09:51
Like, we really enjoy it.
00:09:53
It gets heated sometimes, obviously, as you would expect.
00:09:55
Yeah.
00:09:56
I'm competitive.
00:09:57
What are you going to do next?
00:09:58
Like, sorry.
00:09:59
Like, when you're on the, you're no longer husband and wife.
00:10:01
Yeah.
00:10:02
Yeah.
00:10:03
But I think that because of that, we like have a good mindset about it.
00:10:07
Like, we know we're competitors.
00:10:08
If we argue on a call or something, like, we do with our teammates and with other people, like, as soon as the bounce over, we're like, well, that was just us being competitors and trying to train.
00:10:18
And like, now we're back to husband and wife from like-- Right.
00:10:21
Honestly, I don't argue calls that much, except for when I'm fencing him.
00:10:24
Yeah.
00:10:25
Then I let it all out.
00:10:26
I'm like-- Yeah.
00:10:28
It's my call.
00:10:29
Or it doesn't count.
00:10:30
Right.
00:10:31
Like any good marriage.
00:10:32
Any good marriage.
00:10:33
Any good marriage.
00:10:34
All right.
00:10:35
Last question.
00:10:36
So when either of you are competing, is it, are you more nervous before your own competition or are you more nervous for your partner?
00:10:46
Definitely for my partner.
00:10:50
Yeah.
00:10:51
I just went all this success in the world and I wanted him to feel good about his fencing.
00:10:55
And I just hope I can help get him there.
00:10:58
So it's like a stress for me and just love.
00:11:01
Yeah.
00:11:02
Definitely more.
00:11:03
Especially during the tournament, I'm way more nervous for her and hoping that she'll do well.
00:11:09
Hopefully the goal is always to win, but aside from that, even just like that, she'd be happy with her fencing after, you know, regardless of the result.
00:11:16
I think before the event, I have full confidence that she's going to do great.
00:11:21
And so I'm definitely more nervous about myself because I'm thinking more about like before my event.
00:11:27
Yeah.
00:11:28
That's a good point.
00:11:29
But during the event, I'm more nervous.
00:11:30
More nervous for her.
00:11:31
Yeah.
00:11:32
Carefully.
00:11:33
Thank you so much for stopping by.
00:11:34
I know you have a busy day.
00:11:35
It's only just getting started.
00:11:36
Congratulations, and best of luck to both of you from here and beyond.
00:11:48
Thank you.
00:11:49
It was fun.
00:11:50
Yeah.
00:11:51
This was really nice.
00:11:52
We're going to leave now because I can't get better.
00:11:53
Yeah.
00:11:54
You're not.
00:11:55
And it's so like these kids.
00:11:56
I hear and sweat.
00:11:57
Follow the show in the IHAR app Apple Podcasts, Stitcher, Amazon Music, or your favorite podcast platform.
00:11:57
And watch and listen to every moment of the 2024 Parasolumpic Games from July 26 through August 11 on NBC and Peacock and for the first time ever on the IHAR app.
00:12:07
[MUSIC]
00:12:17
It’s truly inspiring to see Lee Kiefer and Gerek Meinhardt, both Olympians, balancing their rigorous training and relationship so well. https://www.maxim-timeclock.com