PARIS, France — Twelve miles north of central Paris sits the small, quiet suburb of Eaubonne. Despite its close proximity to the chaos of the French capital, the area is only filled with the sound of wind blowing through the trees and homes fit for quiet living. It may not seem like the 2024 Summer Olympics have touched this place, but just a 10-minute walk from the train station sits one of the most advanced training facilities the Games have to offer: Team USA’s high-performance center.
The United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee partnered with ATHLETICA to create a home base for Team USA in the small suburb. Disconnected but easily accessible to the Olympic Village, the Team USA HPC has state-of-the-art facilities that allow U.S. athletes feel more connected with each other.
Close to 450 Team USA athletes across 30 Olympics and Paralympics sports will have access to the HPC’s facilities and services. Specifically, 16 Olympic sports will have 300 athletes during the Olympics, and 12 sports will have 150 athletes for the Paralympics.
“We want Team USA athletes (to) have the best opportunity to perform on the field of play,” USOPC Chief of Olympic Sport Finbarr Kirwan said. “For us, this location in this facility is the embodiment of that.”
The idea for the Team USA HPC has been around since 2008, and the Paris facility isn’t the first. In the 2020 Tokyo Games, about 60% of USA medalists trained at the HPC made for those Olympics, which included 336 athletes, 17 sports, and 144 medalists. However, it wasn’t as inclusive as the 2024 version. In the 2016 Rio Games, most athletes competed at the IWF Training Hall.
The 2024 Athletica HPC began prepping for Team USA in 2018. The USOPC was vetting sites for the Paris Games HPC and came across ATHLETICA due to its good infrastructure and location. They sent an email in August 2018 to the training center, which Zumaglia thought was suspicious at first because it was a spam email that didn’t come directly from the USOPC. After initial contact, ATHLETICA asked for them to come in two weeks because the facility was under construction, but Team USA wanted to show up in 48 hours. Despite not being ready for them, the USOPC showed up two days later.
“When Team USA came in, it was the first step of the dream we are meeting right now,” said, General Director and CEO of ATHLETICA Arnaud Zumaglia. “We are very proud to welcome them here and to do everything possible to integrate the best services we can.”
The facility accommodates all types of sports, including outdoor areas for triathlon, pentathlon and rugby. The indoor facilities include a massive indoor track, a pool area for water polo and artistic swimming and top-notch training spaces for weightlifting, gymnastics, breaking, fencing and more.
The HPC offers better options than what most athletes have available to them in the Olympic Village. The practice times are particular and are limited to only 90 minutes per day, Team USA wrestling coach Mike Gattone said. The teams also would be unable to acquire enough credentials for athletes to bring their personal coaches into the village for training.
“Coming here, we get to keep the personal coaches and athletes together,” Gattone said. “That’s really big, and I can find most of the resources I need. If I ask the Olympic Committee, they’ll find it.”
Outside of training, the ATHLETICA facility and Team USA provide complete medical and recovery facilities, a nutrition and meal cafeteria and mental wellness and psychology services. Athletes can also access a Team USA lounge, high-tech massage tables, cryotherapy pods and 100 sleeping rooms.
The facility’s renovation cost approximately $29 million, Reuters reported, which was funded by ATHLETICA. Team USA paid for two and a half months worth of rent, which went toward the renovations, Zumaglia said. The rent means that the facility is only accessible to Team USA during the contract, so ATHLETICA’s other clients are unable to use it during the games. Kirwan said the final price is still undetermined.
“To be able to have somewhat of a normal training environment is something (which) we’re very used to, has been very comforting,” Team USA weightlifter Jourdan Delacruz said. “It’s been really easy to adjust as an athlete traveling all the way out here to Paris.”
However, the HPC’s purpose isn’t only to provide athletes with incredible equipment. THE USOPC wanted to ensure the complex allowed athletes to train together. Kiran made this a key point for the HPC as it creates a “teamship” that the athletes don’t usually have in the crowded Olympic Village.
The athletes across all sports at the HPC interact with each other daily when training. For example, fencing and breaking practice is done in the same gymnasium, with one side dedicated to each sport, while weightlifting is directly next door.
“It feels like being at a University,” Gattone said. “You look out there, and you see break dancing and fencing, and you got three-on-three basketball. Then, being in the dining hall, we see a lot of superstars on the Olympic Team. It makes them (the athletes) feel a lot more excited to be here.”
While many of these sports focus on individual performance and success, Team USA gets the chance to practice and recover under one roof as a unit. Delacruz described her experience doing her accessories next to two-time gold medalist runner Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone. She also watched the USA Men’s Gymnastics medal while getting a massage with five-time gold medal-winning gymnast Simone Biles and gold medalist Jordan Chiles.
“Being around greatness all day, every day is amazing,” Team USA artistic swimmer Daniella Ramirez said. “It reminds you how hard you’ve worked and how hard everybody else in the world has worked. (It’s)really motivating to me to see how everybody else is working just as hard as you are.”
After Team USA’s 60 days of using the facility for the Olympics and Paralympics, the facility will continue to welcome athletes of the highest level worldwide. ATHLETICA will work with different federations and clubs to select athletes to train at the facility, including a few NFL athletes who have trained there. The facility will also bring in almost 300,000 athletes aged 13-19 to train and host nearly 80 competitions a year.
But for now, the HPC is Team USA’s home away from home.
For more stories from Cronkite News, visit cronkitenews.azpbs.org.
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