Three-time Olympian Casey Eichfeld is hoping to earn his first Olympic medal in Rio.

His coach Rafal Smolen says “He's shown last year that he's one of the best in the world.”

Eichfeld grew up in Pennsylvania but he moved to the Charlotte area to train at the U.S. National Whitewater Center.

The 26-year-old is a canoe slalom athlete who says canoeing has been part of his life for as long as he can remember.

“When I was 2 years old, my dad made this Halloween costume. It was a green cardboard canoe with suspenders, and it had 2004 Olympics on the side of it,” Eichfeld said.

Back then, that may have been an ambitious dream, but it came true in 2008, again in 2012 and again in 2016.
He said “We are often told by our coaches you're going to have one good competition out of 10, but then eventually it's going to become two good competitions out of 10. So it's just kind of moving that ratio up, taking the time remembering that you will be able to get there.”

In Rio, Eichfeld will be the first American canoe athlete to compete in two different categories in one Olympic games.

C1 is solo canoeing. C2 is with a partner.

“Canoe slalom is sort of like dancing on the water and C2 is just partnering,” Eichfeld said. “So you learn that person and how they are going to react to the water. So not only are you trying to build this instinctual encyclopedia of how whitewater works, we also have to learn our canoe partner so that way we can react to how they react to the water.”

And standing by his side through this Olympic journey has been his fiance, Sarah Anderson.

“We met back in China, and we were dating through London, and now we are engaged through Rio,” she said.

They plan on getting married in December.

Anderson said “I'm not sure there's a way to describe him. He's just... He's just my Casey. He's intense. He's determined. He's loving.”

So this is a big year for this couple. When it comes to Eichfeld's dream and passion for whitewater sports, he says those dreams go far beyond the Olympic stage.

“Certainly I want to be able to do very well for the sport as well... Make sure that I can help this sport to continue to exist,” he said. “I want to see we get some youth into the sport and breathe some life into it.”