Skye Blakely on second Olympic push: "I'm a little more determined this year"
Four years ago, U.S. gymnast Skye Blakely was thrust into the spotlight when the delay of the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 until 2021 suddenly made her age eligible.
“That was kind of interesting knowing that at 2020 was like the big year, but it's been moved,” Blakely told Olympics.com in June 2020. “Then, I heard a little bit of talk about how girls who were born in 2005 would be able to go, and that made me really happy because knowing my chance to go made me really excited because my eyes were set on 2024.”
But her run at Tokyo didn’t go the way she’d hoped.
A talented junior – she was a member of the U.S. team for her first-ever Junior World Championships in 2019 – Blakely impressed early in the season in 2021, winning the balance beam at the Winter Cup.
She was seventh at the U.S. championships later in the year, easily advancing to the U.S. Olympic trials, but an injury there on the vault derailed her.
One thing it didn’t do: deter her.
A year later, Blakely was an integral part of the U.S. team that won the gold medal at the 2022 World Championships. Individually, she advanced to the balance beam final.
In 2023, Blakely was once again a member of Team USA’s dominating golden squad.
“I believe I am a lot more experience and I know what to expect a lot more and overall more confident going into this year,” Blakely told a small group of reporters, including Olympics.com, earlier this year at a USA Gymnastics media availability.
“I’d say in 2021, it was kind of a surprise, just not sure, just going to go with the flow. But now, I feel like I’m a little more determined this year.”
Blakely's 2021 injury was a turning point
Though undeterred, Blakely did use her 2021 setback for growth.
“After getting injured, I went through a point where I was a little bit mentally not strong. I was just overall sad, not in a good place,” she admitted. “After coming back from that and being built back up, I was just so determined to get back to where I wanted to be and that just pushed me and kept me wanting more.”
That process involved leaning on her parents and also working with a sports psychologist, who Blakely says has been instrumental in getting her better in touch with her emotions.
“I’m really used to keeping how I feel inside not sharing it with others, just kind of dealing with on my own, so kind of having to be vulnerable and share how I’m feeling in my emotions was hard at first,” she said. “But now, I’m more comfortable with it because I understand getting it out makes me feel better.”
It’s also made a difference.
“I’d say after I got hurt, I wouldn’t have believed I would have gone to two worlds and been back here [in an Olympic year] again,” Blakely said.
Fueling her dream
Blakely knows there’s work to be done. She’s especially hard on herself when things don’t go exactly as planned, including an error on the beam last year that kept her from the individual apparatus final.
“Beam… it’s a little harder to handle the pressure because four inches, you know? A lot of things can go wrong,” Blakely said. “The Worlds beam routine didn’t go how I wanted, but I feel like every time I compete, especially at a big meet, I’m growing and learning more every time.”
Her 2024 season includes a second-place effort in the all-around at the Winter Cup in February, where she also won the balance beam title with a 14.500.
She placed fifth overall at the U.S. Classic, despite missing a low to high transition element on the uneven bars.
Three years after missing out on Tokyo 2020, Blakely is once again very much in the mix for a ticket to join the U.S. squad in Paris.
Blakely also knows she needs to try let go of the errors and focus her energy elsewhere.
“I definitely do believe that I’m hard on myself… I try not to let one bad moment kind of get in the way of the big moment,” she said. “I feel like that’s something I have to remember: yes, be proud of the good and use the bad to motivate me to be better.”