Jöna Aigouy will not go to the Paris 2024 Games: “I am building something big for the future”

La Millavoise a le regard tourné vers d’autres objectifs. JA

La Millavoise avait fait des Jeux olympiques de Paris 2024 son objectif majeur.

Giving up a lifelong dream is never easy. The javelin thrower, Jöna Aigouy, however, resigned herself. She will not wear the tricolor tunic on the track redone in purple at the Stade de France for the Paris Olympic Games.

However, the Millavoise had put all the chances on her side after her cruciate ligament rupture. First, put your head back upright, then put on the heating blue to regain its level. A long work to find a routine, a gesture that the body had lost during convalescence.

From Saint-Raphaël to New Caledonia

The Millavoise therefore left Creps de Saint-Raphaël, where she had been accustomed to for several years. She also changed training structure, to go to New Caledonia and learn another way of doing things. "The objective was to participate in competitions in Australia, New Zealand, she explains.

As the quest for success is far from being a linear staircase where all the steps are easily climbed, she had to take care of financing this great project. If France claims to be a country of sport, the fact remains that the best javelin thrower in the country – champion of France in 2023 – stood on her own, thanks to a furniture sale and an online crowdfunding campaign, to support herself as a high-level athlete. Some local partners such as the City of Millau, Boissières et fils and the Léonie brand also supported it.

A four-year plan

After that, the Millavoise rebuilt herself, physically, to once again throw her javelin on tartan even further than before.  "We wanted to look for ranking points for qualification for the Games and, with hindsight, I think that we had the wrong strategy and we didn’not have good conditions on the competitions in which we are involved, she analyzes.

Not enough, therefore, to meet the necessary conditions to hope to participate in the Paris Games, his dream and to tread the tartan of the Stade de France. "I think I'm building something big for the future, positive the’athlete.  We built a four-year plan with short-term deadlines to get to the Los Angeles Games and if I go, it won't be just to say that I'm taking part in the Games.&quot ;

An installation in Finland

For this new cycle which is beginning, change of hemisphere. Let's go to Finland where she has settled down. "It’is the temple of throwing !", she justifies, with the passion overflowing from her eyes. "I can meet the world's best athletes there, exchange ideas, observe… Everything is done to succeed."

That's why she established her base camp there after a season where the results were not up to what she expected. rsquo;she hoped, until the 2024 French championships where she lost her title (she finished 2nd).

"The competition was a reflection of the season, continues the athlete.&nbsp ;But I got richer and grew up." If the French javelin will not be represented in Paris among the women , she intends to make it shine on the road that will lead to Los Angeles.