Olympic Gold Medalist Gwen Jorgensen Gives Back Through Scholarship Fund
2016 Olympic gold medalist Gwen Jorgensen has partnered with the USA Triathlon Foundation to create a scholarship fund “to support economically disadvantaged children and youth entering the sport of triathlon.”
The Gwen Jorgensen Scholarship Fund is a collaboration between Jorgensen, her husband Patrick Lemieux, and Scott Filion, a friend and training partner. The initial $35,000 they put into the scholarship is likely to grow as other people have asked to donate to the program.
Donors who are interested in supporting the Gwen Jorgensen Scholarship Fund can donate here.
Jorgensen and Lemieux organized a similar program for three years leading up to her gold-medal performance in Rio.
“I actually race with some people who were scholarship winners,” Jorgensen said in an interview earlier today. “I feel old, but I think it really does make a difference.”
The impetus to renew the program came after Filion noticed that Jorgensen had posted on Instagram that she was giving away some gear. Filion expressed a desire to help people get into the sport.
“I said I used to do this scholarship and I’d love to bring it back,” Jorgensen said. “So, he committed some money and we decided to commit some money to bring the scholarship back.”
The scholarship grants provide up to $1,500 for individuals or $5,000 per team.
“We’re focussing on grassroots, or juniors, or youth,” Jorgensen continued. “If there’s a team that’s looking to buy some bikes for their team or … fund some races or … put on a race for juniors. Anything that’s supporting youth or juniors.”
For both Lemieux and Jorgensen the scholarship is recognition of just how much support they received during her run to Olympic gold.
“I think one thing that’s been evident to me and Gwen is that, in observing her career, she had a ton of people that assisted her along the way,” Lemieux said. “That could be from the local furniture store that helped get her to her first Olympics, the local car dealership that gave her a car to get to the pool. We’ve just experienced such an immense amount of generosity for her in her career and for us to pay that back and push that forward has been something that’s really important to us. Triathlon, cycling, these sports are really expensive to get into, and if there’s a way that we can minimize that that lift, that’s something that we really want to try and help people with.”
Jorgensen looks back at that support as being a critical part of her triathlon success.
“This comes back to just how many people invested in me and believed in me when maybe I didn’t even believe in myself and really got me to the starting line,” she said. “ I was somebody who didn’t even know about triathlon? And I was told ‘you could be an Olympian.’ And I thought they were crazy when they said that. When I started triathlon, I didn’t have a bike and somebody gave me a bike to have for free. I wouldn’t have even got into this sport if I didn’t have access to those things. I do want to make it more accessible, and a big reason we want to do grassroots is we want to get more people involved in the sport. It really is important.”
In addition to the financial support, Jorgensen has also enjoyed supporting scholarship winners in other ways, including mentoring.
“That has definitely been a role in it and something that I’m willing to do this year as well,” she said. “ I think this year we’re focussing a lot more on grassroots. But, in the past, I was available to talk to scholarship winners and I talked to each of them at least once. Sometimes we worked with a few junior groups as well – coaches would say this person is struggling with this, would you mind talking to them? That was definitely a part of it and something that I think will continue.”
Working with the USA Triathlon Foundation was important to both Lemieux and Jorgensen, not only because the foundation can administer the program and take donations due to it’s 501c3 status, but also to help increase awareness of what the foundation does.
“Part of the reason I wanted to work with the foundation is that, as elites, we rely on the foundation’s financial donations,” Jorgensen said. “ And so bringing awareness to the foundation is something that I’m excited about in order to hopefully grow not only the grassroots part of the sport, but also the elite level of racing.”
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Excellent news, having been around juniors who benefitted years ago from the 1st iteration of the GJ Scholarships, this is good news for the youth/junior pipeline.
Also a good business move on their part to keep her brand and name relevant.
Very smart.
I assume there’s some compensation for the management of this as well. Winwin
Suggesting GJ is getting “paid” to do this? I would say that’s probaly not a good assumption, sometimes people really do give back with no other strings attached. IE- all the money is assuredly going to go back to the youth/juniors who they pick as the winners of the scholarships.
That’s a bad take or assumption Lurker imo.
Does Ironman pay someone to administrate the IM Foundation? Is that a bad take or unsavory?
Money isn’t a dirty word. I don’t think people should only do good for free.
Lurker, your reaching here buddy. I say it’s a bad take because this foundation/fundraiser is $35k worth of scholarships for youth and juniors. To even bring up IM foundation as a comparison just shows your trolling dude. (In 20+ years IM Foundation has provided $60mi to over 10k organizations/groups). To suggest the 2 are anywhere close to similiar again, one hell of a take.
If you think GJ is getting paid to run this scholarship/foundation, thumbs up to you. Keep on trolling my man with takes like that.
If they’re giving 35k/year. I get the point of a press release. But a one time gift this small just doesn’t get much pub anywhere ever.
Ironman Foundation has 5 full time employees. Their financials from 2022-2014 are posted. They do great things.
I mean they have to do a press release to simply get the info out to people to actually apply (the application is in the press release). And when the only gold medalist in your federation decides to give back, of course that’s going to be recogninzed. What’s cool is that from what I’ve seen in the 15 years of being around that demographic, the sport is getting more and more *diverse. Support like this can only help, and I think one thing we are seeing is that the covid years has had an impact on youth and junior triathlons in the U.S. There is certainly less opportunities in the sport than there was 6-8 years ago, imo.
(I can’t remember the last year of the GJ scholarship the 1st go around, I can’t remember how many years it lasted, but seemed to help kids the 1st time go around).
My assumption is the gift is to jump start the thing then solicit the involvement of others knowing that a reputable crew is running it. Part of her mission with sponsor relations can be to support this foundation which is tax deductible, unlike simply paying her a sponsorship fee. She will then do good things to help some triathletes while also promoting those sponsors etc.
Presumably, in someway, something comes back to benefit her. And I DO NOT think that’s unsavory.
Only a fool or an ideologue (but I repeat myself) wants a charity to be setup so it’s unsustainable where no one has an interest in keeping the thing going other than being a nice person. Most of us are nice people at various times in our lives. When we have a vested interest in continuing to do Nice things the world is improved.
Ironman makes money. Ironman uses a 501c to support various groups and causes that very often, if not nearly always, provide benefit to Ironmans profitable business. Makes sense to have the IM Foundation setup this way.
I sure hope the Jorgensen foundation is setup in a way that she is benefited from continuing to maintain it other than the goodness of her heart and self sacrifice that leaves her poorer in the end.
From GJ herself:
“Triathlon changed my life, and I want to help open that door for the next generation — especially kids who might not have the resources to get started. Through this scholarship fund, we’re breaking down financial barriers and making triathlon more accessible,” Jorgensen said. “Every child deserves the chance to dream big, and I’m excited to be part of a movement that helps them chase those dreams.”
Sorry bud, but sometimes it can be as simple as wanting to give back, and not worrying about what you get back in return or “benefit from”. That’s wild that you took that angle from this announcement, how GJ can benefit, from a grassroots triathlon give back program. But to each their own.
It’s a scholarship fund at USA Triathlon Foundation which has primed the pump of the NCAA initiative. But at any place I’ve been to have a named scholarship fund that others can contribute to generally requires enough from that individual to endow it in perpetuity. Her sponsors may likely contribute, but that doesn’t help her bottom line that much…now they could increase her payout that she can then offset her own tax burden with.
I looked at itemization after I went back to W-2 and the reason for the standard deduction is to get rid of itemization really. I looked at how much money we would have to donate to get to the itemized deduction numbers and it was insane. That is literally for the wealthy.
at the end of the day this is what an oly champ can do and it adds value to the sport
ie it will be rather valuable for each of the athletes that will get the grand.
I say well done.
You should try being a nice person with no money to show for it for an extended period. It’s not impossible
Look, some people are charitable. If you want to be cynical, think of it as massaging their own ego, or wanting to go to fancy parties with other people who do charity, or improving your public image (which you didn’t do any favors in this thread to be brutally honest
), or self-image, or whatever. It’s a fact of life that people practice charity sustainably with no financial gain.