‘I’m so happy, these have been crazy days’, says Caroline Groot.

The 26-year-old criminal law student at the UG took the first gold medal at the 2024 Paralympics in Paris last week and broke her world record in the 500-metre track time trial. 

The day after winning her race was a whirlwind: interviews, TV appearances, and an exclusive tour of the Eiffel Tower. Surviving on cookies and three hours of sleep, she barely had time to sit down and take in what she had just achieved.

Botched surgery

Groot’s journey to gold started when she was just 16. At the time, she was an accomplished ice skater, competing for the Netherlands underage. But a botched surgery on her leg left her with permanent nerve damage, ending her dream of skating in the Olympics.

After two years of rehabilitation, she was told that she would not be able to skate again at the level she wanted. In the meantime, she was introduced to Paralympic cycling and was hooked. A new dream began.

I wanted to go to the Winter Games, and now I’m at the Summer Games

‘My whole life revolved around ice skating, because I wanted to go to the Winter Games. And now I am at the Summer Games, so I think it’s a happy ending after all’, she says. 

But this wasn’t her first Paralympic success. She picked up a bronze medal at the Tokyo Games in 2021. 

She thought of quitting after Tokyo, but was disappointed with not winning gold, and with the next games only three years away, she decided to give it another go. And so Groot spent that time balancing a heavy training schedule with university work, finishing her bachelor and working through a master. 

Balancing commitments

Training five times a week in Arnhem and Apeldoorn meant that normal student experiences like moving away, going out, and attending classes in person were never a real option. Instead, she lived at home in Doetinchem throughout her studies, only coming to Groningen for exams. ‘It’s not the best combination,’ she says, ‘because I’m doing everything at home, so it’s kind of self-studying.’

Learning to balance her focus between studying and training was a skill that she needed to develop over time. She trained for Tokyo while she was just 22 and doing her bachelor. ‘In the beginning, when I was on the bike, I thought, oh no, I have to study. And when I was studying, I thought, oh no, I have to train.’

I like that cycling doesn’t occupy my head all day

While training for Paris, she found it a bit easier to balance her commitments, though. ‘I’m older, so everything is easier. It’s not all new anymore’, she explains. Now, studying even feels like a refuge and a good chance to switch off from cycling. ‘I like that cycling doesn’t occupy my head all day.’

It helps that she enjoys learning about the law and is passionate about becoming a criminal lawyer after she graduates. ‘It feels like I’m working on my future.’

Qualification

Still, managing a busy university course, training, and travelling around the world for competitions is not easy with the World Championships always seeming to clash with exams. ‘It’s always bad timing’, she says.

For instance, last year’s World Championships in Rio de Janeiro, where she picked up gold, fell one week before her exam week started. Preparing for the race left her little time to study beforehand. It meant she was coming back from Brazil with a medal, but jetlagged and with lots of cramming to do.

She can’t just skip one of these competitions when it suits her, though: winning at them is vital to qualify for the Paralympics, because only three women from the Netherlands get to go to the Games for cycling events. Her gold medal in Brazil helped secure her place in Paris, but it wasn’t until July that she found out for sure she would be going. 

Media attention

Though Paris was not her first trip to the Paralympics, it felt like her first real experience of the Games, she says. ‘Tokyo’s Games were kind of weird with Covid and the empty stadiums, so it didn’t feel like a real Paralympics.’ 

With sports, you think in four-year instalments

This time around, the vibe in the Paralympic village was much better. ‘It’s very special to have so many friends and family here, as well as my teammates.’  

But with her winning the first medal of these Games, there was a lot of media attention on her, and not a lot of time to spend with her people immediately after her victory. ‘I talked to the BBC and six or seven other international media outlets’, she recounts.

She wouldn’t like to have to field all that attention daily, but ‘it was a good medal to win’, she says, because it gave her the chance to promote the Games across the world. ‘We have to be happy with all the media attention we get at the Paralympics.’

Moving on

Groot has loved this life and has learned a lot about herself since she started competing seven years ago, she says. But cycling takes so much time that it sometimes feels like she is standing still in life and now she is ready to move on: she has decided to retire from cycling. 

‘I want to be a lawyer, and with sports, you think in four-year instalments, from Olympics to Olympics. And I’m not going to do four years extra to go to LA’, she says. ’I’m going to miss it, but I am very happy it is done now and I can finally do all the other stuff in life.’  

And she is wasting no time doing that. The day after she returns to the Netherlands, less than a week after taking the gold, she will start an internship at a criminal law firm in Amsterdam. ‘I’m really looking forward to it and now I have time to think about it and not have to think about all that cycling stuff’, she laughs.

That said, she is happy to go out on top, as a Paralympic champion and a world-record holder. ‘These were my last Games and I did my best.’

Dutch