Next week, an archer from Brockton, Massachusetts, will compete in hopes of qualifying for the Paris Olympics.
If she succeeds, this will be the second time 21-year-old Jennifer Mucino Fernandez represents Team USA in the Olympics.
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Her Olympic journey began when she was a child living in Mexico.
"Apparently, I started saying that I wanted to be an Olympian when I was really young," she said. "Like, 6, 7 years old.
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She tried different sports, ultimately choosing to pursue archery after seeing it in a magazine about the Pan American Games that took place in Mexico.
"My mom was like, 'I have no idea what it is, but sure,'" said Mucino Fernandez. "So we found a field like 30 minutes from my house. It was more like a, you know, like a hunting kind of field."
They also found a trainer who worked with them for about a year and a half before she faced health problems, and her mom stepped in as coach.
"My mom always kept reading, kept investigating, kept learning to make us better archers," said Mucino Fernandez.
Looking back, she admits that at 11 years old, she was not an easy student.
"I feel bad because, I mean, she is my mom, after all, and it is not always easy to listen to your mom all the time," she said with a laugh. "So back then, it was like if I didn't want to do something, I didn't necessarily listen to her even though she was my coach."
Her mom, Rosa Mucino, also laughed when asked if it was easy teaching her daughter.
"No, not at first," said Mucino in Spanish. "It was a bit difficult to say, 'I am not your mother here, I am your coach.' To make that distinction of mom at home and coach in the field, it was a process, but then it was easy. She is very talented and it was easy to help her get to where she is."
Mucino Fernandez quickly leveled up to the elite training center in Mexico.
After years of training six days a week, she was burned out.
"I didn't shoot for like a month," she said. "I didn't want to see my bow."
Her mom encouraged her to compete at the trials for the 2015 Pan American games.
She missed the cut for Team USA by one spot, but then, she learned another archer dropped out, and she was in. Her drive to compete was back, and she was at the top of her game going into the 2019 Youth World Championships.
"So that's when I had to make the decision to the U.S. or Mexico," she said.
Mucino Fernandez chose Team USA and began her first Olympic Trials when the pandemic hit.
With everything coming to a halt, she stopped training and considered quitting archery.
"[It was] like a really like a tricky spot, because I was like, 'OK, I haven't been training for a year. I'm in college right now. Is it really what I want to keep doing in my life?' I didn't know if I wanted to quit, and I was like, 'OK, if I want to quit, like, this would be like the perfect time, I haven't been shooting.' A lot of archers quit during COVID," said Mucino Fernandez. "I talked to my parents, and they were like, you know, like, 'Just finish it. Just finish the trials.'"
She made it to the Tokyo Olympics, placing 8th and 17th.
"In Tokyo, like, I don't really feel like it hit me that I was in the Olympics, like part of the Olympic team, until I was in the [Olympic] village," Mucino Fernandez said.
Now, she's in San Diego preparing for her second Olympic Trials. Her family turned every obstacle into an opportunity to help make that childhood dream come true.
"I don't think I could be here without them. My mom, she trained me for three years, and she was still behind me most of the time. She was behind me when I made the Olympic team. So she has been there the whole way," said Mucino Fernandez. "My dad has always been there, like, you know, more in the backstage, always making sure that we are there, always making sure they have something to eat, snack on. So like, you know, like any parent, I feel like most of us wouldn't be here without their support."
"I am very proud," Mucino said of her daughter in Spanish. "Because it was a dream that began with her that the whole family supported, hours of studying, working, my husband supporting everything at home, helping with my daughter. It was a complicated process that took a lot of time, a lot of dedication from the whole family."
"The ultimate goal is a gold Olympic medal, but I don't know, I don't think I would be satisfied or content with myself if I get Olympic medal," said Mucino Fernandez. "I would like to be one of those archers that is always in the podium, is always on the top, is always fighting for those medals, in every competition."
