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Australian Olympian Patched Kayak With Condom, Barfed, and Then Won Gold

Jess Fox said of her pre-race retching, “OK, my body’s ready, that’s just my body telling me to get ready for something big.”

An Australian canoer and kayaker competing in the Tokyo Olympics had a bumpy ride to her gold medal this week that involved a condom and significant amount of retching. The nose of Jess Fox’s kayak was damaged prior to her final race, and she posted a video of herself stretching a condom over the craft saying, “Bet you never knew condoms could be used for kayak repairs.” Before her C1 race, Fox said, the food she had eaten between runs “didn’t sit well,” so she stole away from her teammates to vomit behind tents at the Kasai Canoe Slalom Centre. She said, “I just thought, ‘OK, my body’s ready, that’s just my body telling me to get ready for something big…’ I told [Fox’s coach] that I’d thrown up. I was like, ‘I feel really good, but I just threw up, so I’ll be all right.’ And then we fist-bumped.” She went on to win gold in the women’s C1 canoe slalom and bronze in the canoe K1 slalom.