In early March, pro women’s freestyle BMX rider Nikita Ducarroz moved to Holly Springs, North Carolina, a town with a population of less than 40,000, located nearly 3,000 miles from her hometown in California.
Why Holly Springs? Because that’s where the Daniel Dhers Action Sports Complex, the largest action sports training facility in the world, is located. In her journey to qualify for the Tokyo 2020 Olympics, Ducarroz planned to undergo intensive training there.
A confluence of events led to Ducarroz’s decision to relocate to North Carolina when she did—a move that proved to be more than fortuitous. The Swiss American had been training with her coach in the Netherlands, but his local park was closing down for a nine-month renovation. Ducarroz had ridden at Daniel Dhers—a BMX Mecca that has also recently housed Team USA’s Hannah Roberts and Perris Benegas, Team Australia’s Brandon Loupos and, of course, owner Dhers—for two weeks in January. So, Ducarroz and her coach made a plan: she would relocate to North Carolina as her home base leading up to the final Olympic qualifiers, and he and his wife and new baby would join her there.
A week after Ducarroz arrived, the world ground to a halt with the continued spread of Covid-19 in the United States. Now, she will remain there indefinitely.
Link to interview: https://www.forbes.com/sites/michellebruton/2020/06/21/nikita-ducarroz-put-womens-freestyle-bmx-on-the-map-tokyo-olympics/#772045b63613
