IOC President Kirsty Coventry visits Utah kids as excitement builds for 2034 Winter Games

SALT LAKE CITY — Seven and a half years can seem like a long time. For a child, it can be almost a lifetime.

But for some of the Utah kids who met International Olympic Committee President Kirsty Coventry on Wednesday, it could be the amount of time between dreaming about the Olympics and perhaps competing in them.

Coventry spent part of her first visit to Utah since becoming IOC president with students at Washington Elementary School in Salt Lake City, where the state's preparations for the 2034 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games are already reaching into classrooms.

Later in the day, she traded the classroom for the ice rink, visiting young hockey players with the Utah Lady Grizzlies, an all-girls hockey organization that draws players from across Utah and the Mountain West.

Both stops offered a glimpse of something Utah 2034 organizers said they are trying to accomplish long before the Olympic flame returns to the state, which is to make young Utahns feel like the Games already belong to them.

At Washington Elementary, students entered an assembly carrying banners they made in their classrooms as Olympians, Paralympians and community leaders welcomed them as "champions."

Coventry joined the celebration as part of Champion Schools 34, an education initiative that launched earlier this month in 70+ elementary schools across seven Utah school districts.

The program builds on the IOC's Olympic Values Education Program, incorporating Olympic values such as excellence, respect and friendship into lessons while also emphasizing reading and education.

Washington Elementary was the eighth school to hold an Olympic-style opening ceremony for the program.

For Coventry, a seven-time Olympic medalist and two-time Olympic swimming champion, seeing children connect with the Games so far ahead of 2034 was part of the point.

"I think this is where everyone starts, right? This is where our journey starts. This is where we find the love of sport," she said.

By the time the Winter Games return to Utah, the children sitting in the school's gym Wednesday will be eight years older.

"Some will be 18, some will be 16, some could be competing," said Coventry. "You could see their little faces sort of light up and think, 'Oh, I could be doing that.' And that for us is where the excitement is."

Coventry said the reaction became especially noticeable when students saw Olympic and Paralympic athletes in the room.

"Then it's real for them," she said. "Then they're like, 'Oh my gosh, that's so cool.'"

Amy Garff, chair of the Utah 2034 Education Committee, said having the IOC president participate helped reinforce the message organizers hope children take from the program.

"That was so exciting that she wanted to share that time and also highlight this program, because it's so important that we teach these values to these kids," said Garff. "If we can start now, that's the best."

Coventry said the emphasis on education also reminded her of her own experience as a student-athlete at Auburn University.

Her head coach, she said, made academics a condition of competing and traveling with the team.

"No matter what, your education is just as important as what you do on the field of play," said Coventry. "These kids are learning that even now. So, I just think they're going to be set up for huge, huge success in their futures."

As students returned to their classrooms, Olympians and Paralympians handed each child a book to take home.

A few hours later, Coventry's audience was older and wearing skates.

She visited girls ages 14 to 16 from the Utah Lady Grizzlies at Steiner Ice Arena within the Salt Lake City Sports Complex.

Coventry watched practice, spent time with the young athletes and talked with them about sports and the Olympic experience.

Utah 2034 also presented financial support to the organization in connection with Utah Youth Sports Giving Day.

Abby Osborne, vice president of impact, engagement and enterprise operations for Utah 2034, said Coventry's two stops demonstrated how organizers are trying to build community connections well ahead of the Games.

"These are just the little things that we're doing now seven and a half years out that no other OCOG (Olympic and Paralympic Games Organizing Committee) is doing," said Osborne. "She's really impressed and really energized by the fact that we're so far ahead for the movement this far out and then what that could possibly mean to the movement in the future. It's incredible."

For the girls at the rink, Wednesday began as another chance to practice.

For the elementary students, it began as another school day.

But Coventry's visit also offered both groups a reminder of just how much can happen between now and 2034.

"I think it makes the job a little bit easier, because it sort of reminds you of what you're doing and why you're doing these things," said Coventry.

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