PARIS — Tori Franklin wants you to know that she is OK.
She wasn’t herself at the Tokyo Games, she admits. She didn’t feel ready physically, mentally or spiritually.
But here, at her second Olympics, the U.S. triple jumper has a different perspective. She can enjoy the moment, appreciate the rarified air in which she competes and take pride in what she has accomplished.
“I’ve been on a journey to build myself back up,” she said. “And I’m just in a really good place.”
Franklin, 31, failed to qualify for the triple jump finals Friday, missing the cutoff by about 3 centimeters and finishing 14th overall.
After her final jump, the Chicago resident applauded the supportive crowd and took a bow.
“It’s bittersweet,” she said after the event. “I wanted to do better. I believed I could do better … but at the end of the day, that’s part of the sport. Sometimes, that just happens.”
It’s a far different mindset than after the Tokyo Games, where she finished 25th and did not qualify for the finals.
Devastated by the outcome, she returned to the athletes village, crawled into her cardboard bed and stayed there for the next 24 hours.
The Downers Grove South graduate said she refused to eat or drink anything except for a stale slice of vanilla cake her cousin gave her six days earlier when Franklin left for the Olympics. She watched a sappy rom-com on Netflix to pass the time, then turned it off and simply stared at the hair on her arms.
When she returned home, she blogged about the experience and made a big change. With her family’s encouragement, she moved to Greece and began training with a new coach.
Living more than 5,000 miles from home, she meditated regularly, spent a lot of time outdoors and incorporated therapeutic dance into her self-care routine. Her mother, Tonya, saw the change immediately — both physically and emotionally.
“It has been a long journey,” Tonya Franklin said. “There have been some ups and there have been some downs. But I’ve always tried to get her to focus on doing what she enjoys and she enjoys competing.”
A year after moving to Greece, Franklin — a four-time All-American at Michigan State University — won bronze at the World Championships in 2022 becoming the first American woman to win a medal, of any color, in the triple jump.
“My mentality from Tokyo to the world championships was just completely different,” she said. “In Tokyo, I was just trying to stay afloat. At the World Championships, it was like I didn’t need to worry about it because I had seen myself winning that medal so many times.”
Franklin tore her plantar fascia at the 2023 Worlds and withdrew from the event after qualifying for the final. She found ways to keep busy during her recovery, publishing her memoir “You Anthem: Stories and Reflections of Celebration” and launching the Live Happii Project, which aims to help young people from Chicago’s underserved communities deepen their connections to themselves through holistic self-care.
Taken from the name of Franklin’s longtime social media handles and the title of her blog, the organization will hold its first major event — an old-fashioned field day — on Sept. 21 in Gately Park in Chicago, where her family moved after she graduated high school. Franklin envisions, among other things, three-legged races, tugs-of-war and bounce house obstacle courses.
Basically, all the games Tori liked to play when she was younger.
“Oh, I’ll be out there playing too,” she said, laughing. “We want the entire city to come out and join us.”
Franklin always wants to host holistic track camps in her hometown, where the athletes are taught their mental health is just as important as their physical well-being. She shares her own struggles, she said, explaining how daily meditation, spending time in nature and dancing helped her.
“The goal is to help inner-city, BiPoc youth have a broader vision of what their life can be,” she said. “I’m not telling people you need to always be happy. That’s impossible. It’s about experiencing the emotion, but not letting it define you.”
Franklin practiced what she preached at the U.S. Olympic trials earlier this summer, when she finished third with a performance that did not meet her standards. She initially felt disappointed, uninterested in taking a celebratory walk along the track with her fellow medalists.
Then it hit her.
Life gives a person so few opportunities for a victory lap, she thought. Why let this one get away?
“I decided I could be sad later if I wanted, but I was going to enjoy that moment. I was going to smile. I was going to dance. I was going to sign an autograph for everyone who wanted one,” she said. “I allowed myself to be there. And I was happy.”
She took the same perspective after the Olympic triple jump. She is going to take the next week to enjoy the Summer Games, then return to Chicago this fall to work on Live Happii Project.
“Another reason why I’m still upbeat tonight is that I know my legacy is far bigger than just sport,” she said. “My legacy is going to be the Live Happii Project — and I’m very happy about that.”
