Valentine's Day: Josh Kerr, Idalys Ortyz, Kevin Mayer, Miles-Chamley-Watson and other Olympians explain what they love most about their sport

Valentine’s Day is an excellent occasion to celebrate the love that athletes feel for their sports.

Whether it’s love at first sight or a passion that develops over the years, Olympians like Josh Kerr and Kevin Mayer spoke to Olympics.com about what they love most about their sports.

On 14 February 2024, less than six months before the Olympic Games Paris 2024, let's celebrate how much some of the world's best athletes love their sports.

In sport, as in love, an incredible story can start from an unexpected encounter. That is what happened for France's taekwondo star, Althéa Laurin. She won a bronze medal at Tokyo 2020 and became world champion in 2023, but she came close to not taking up the sport. Her mum wanted her to do karate, but a mistake while waiting at the club in her hometown led her to a taekwondo class.... and the rest is history.

“On the first day, we did some stretching exercises and I seemed to have an aptitude for it. We played a few games, and it was through having a lot of fun that I really got into the sport. I was feeling good about it and in the end I never changed sport.”

To this day, her passion for the sport has not wavered and her collection of international medals highlights just that.

“I enjoy practising taekwondo. I find it very playful. You use your legs in a way that's completely unusual after all. When we're doing warm-ups, we do soft fights with very light strikes, and while we're doing that we're having fun, we're laughing, it becomes a game.”

Koumba Larroque's introduction to wrestling was a bit different. The French athlete discovered her sport by following in the footsteps of her brothers, but she fell in love with it for the same reason as her compatriot Laurin.

"What I liked was first the confrontation and then there was the fact that it was really fun. We played lots of little games and that's what I liked about it. And then, I discovered all the technical aspects, which confirmed that this is what I liked,” the four-time world medallist said to Olympics.com.

In sport, as in love, it's better to make an effort than to be bored

Gianmarco Pozzecco's relationship with basketball began in same the manner as a holiday romance. Vacations abroad brought about revelations for the Athens 2004 silver medalist and current head coach of the Italian team.

“I used to go camping in Croatia and everyone played like Drazen Petrovic, passing the ball between their legs with their tongues out. I didn't become Petrovic, but I was conditioned by him.”

It's similar to a honeymoon with a big orange ball, don't you think?

Some say routine is the enemy of a good relationship. For many, that is also true of sport.

Anthony Jeanjean, bronze medalist at the 2022 BMX Freestyle World Championships, loved the adventurous side of BMX Freestyle.

“I think I liked the discipline as a whole, the fact that it's a spectacular discipline, a high-risk, impressive discipline. As someone who was a bit of a daredevil when I was young, this is something that really represented me.”

For Kevin Mayer, decathlon was the best way to realise his potential without getting bored in training. He tried many sports but never stuck with them once the fun began to fade. All the training had become too repetitive until he discovered combined events in athletics.

“I said to myself, I'm going to try athletics like the other sports I've tried before. And then I arrived and they made me run, then they made me throw, then they made me jump. The next day, they made me run, throw and jump. Absolutely not the same thing. And so on, and so on. Every time I went to compete, I did five or six events while the others only had two. And then at a certain point, I was told to do combined events, and from then on it wasn't even a revelation, it was a predetermined line that I was going to do the decathlon”, the world-record holder, two-time Olympic silver medalist and former world champion said to Olympics.com.

Dedication is one of the keys to making a love story work, and it's even more true when talking about a high-level sport. Whether it's to perform well or to be happy, you have to put a lot of effort in on a daily basis. What Josh Kerr loves so much about athletics are all of the small things he's done in order to perform at the top level. He understood all of the extra time and effort required, and went on to win a bronze medal at Tokyo 2020 and became the 2023 world champion in the 1,500m.

"I love the honesty in the work. There's no real skill to our sport, which means there's no real luck. And so when it comes to putting in the work you know that there's got to be a balance between putting enough work in where you're going to be ready to go and not too much work in where your body's going to fire. I think, you know, that balance and training, balance and lifestyle. Anyone can go out and run every day but it's what you do those other 20 hours a day to make you a professional athlete and to be a professional runner.”

It takes time to build a relationship with sport...

Spending years focused on someone or something can change your perception and the way you express your love. This is true for Rigoberto Uran. The Colombian started road cycling because his father loved the sport. When he died, getting on a bike was a way to carry on his legacy and bring money to his family when they needed it.

“When you start to improve, and also improve your image, improve your life, to have better things, then you start to fall in love with sport.”

But when love is only a matter of money, it can't last. And as the 37-year-old is about to kick off his 19th and final professional season, it would be hard to imagine that there is not something else on his mind when he rides thousands and thousands of kilometres each year.

The London 2012 silver-medalist, who also ended on the podium of the Tour de France and of the Vuelta a España, started to love his sport for something beyond results: he loved it because of what it meant to other people.

“At the end of the day, you are a person who inspires normal people, people who work every day because they see themselves reflected in you. It's something that is cool and makes you love what you do because you know you have a responsibility: you are an ambassador, you send a message,” he said to Olympics.com.

In the end, if an athlete loves their sport, it’s because of the happiness or sadness, laughter or tears, pride or disappointment - everything is just a matter of unpredictable emotions.

“I love the intimacy, the one-on-one combat. Whatever’s going on in your life, you can channel it, you know. If you're angry - whatever. Put the mask on. It’s just you and you. I love that. Everyone’s watching you. And there's, you know, what it brings out of you, the emotions. It’s priceless. You don't know how you're going to come out of there, you know, a wreck or happy or sad”, explained Miles Chamley-Watson, an American fencer who took bronze at the Rio 2016 Games.

You can't envisage sport without the invisible bond it creates between athletes and sports enthusiasts all over the world. This is something Idalys Ortiz, four-time Olympic medallist, touched on when she explained what she loves most about judo.

“I consider that judo is a sport for all people because it's a sport that educates and makes good people, makes humble people... In judo it's not about your name, it's about your soul.”

And so it is with love.