Paris Olympics 2024: Jess Fox and sister Noemie could compete together

Despite all the Olympic medals, there’s one thing that Jess Fox hasn’t ticked off her bucket list. But she believes a new event in Paris could change all of that.

With the one year countdown to Paris just days away, Australian Olympic legend Jess Fox is allowing herself to dream about the only thing still missing from her incredible list of accomplishments.

Fox already has a full set of Olympic medals after winning gold in canoe at the Tokyo Olympics after previously collecting a silver (London 2012) and two bronze medals (Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2021) in kayak.

But the one thing the 29-year-old superstar hasn’t ticked off her bucket list at the Olympics is the experience of competing alongside her younger sister Noemie, who is also a world class paddler.

That’s because until now each country has only been allowed to enter a maximum of one boat in each of the canoeing and kayaking slalom events.

Jessica Fox. Picture: AFP

And because Jess - a 12-time world champion - has been the highest ranked Australian, she’s taken that spot.

But the addition of a new event at next year’s Paris Olympics - kayak cross, also known as extreme slalom - has changed everything and brought the sisters‘ dream closer to reality.

For the first time, each country will be allowed to enter up to two competitors in the new event - raising the real possibility that both Jess and Noemie, 26, will compete against each other in France.

“There is a chance that we could both go,” Jess told this masthead.

“We wouldn‘t both be able to do kayak and canoe. Either one of us would do kayak and one would do canoe or one of us would do both.

“But there is a chance of qualifying two spots in the kayak cross.”

The qualification process for Paris has not yet begun so no-one is taking anything for granted, particularly because the competition is such a standard, and the margins are so fine.

But Jess is hopeful and says her sibling deserves the opportunity,

“Obviously on a personal level for me, it‘s my sister,” she said.

“That‘s always really probably very hard for her, but she’s very mature and gracious and so supportive of me.

“And I know that she does have that drive of going to the Olympics as well. So I really hope that one day we can share that moment together.”

The rules on how many competitors each country can enter at the Olympics are often confusing because they vary from sport to sport.

In swimming, countries are limited to two people for individual races while in athletics countries can enter up to three. In boxing and weightlifting, it’s one per country while in cycling, countries can enter as few as one in some races and up to four in others.

The quota limits are designed to keep the total numbers of athletes at the Games within the overall cap as well as increasing the spread of countries winning medals.

But it also means that sometimes the best athletes don’t get to compete because someone from their own country has taken up their only spot.

Noemie Fox. Picture: Konrad Świerad

“One of the frustrations that we have is that it‘s such a small amount of athletes at the Olympics, especially in our sport, with only 15 quota spots,” said Fox, who is also on the International Olympic Committee’s Athletes Commission.

“Because it‘s one per country, it means that we’ve got a lot of different countries for the number of athletes that we have…which is really good, but it’s always really hard when you know the Olympics is all about unifying and about bringing the best in the world.

“I just wish it was if you were in the top five in the world or the top ten, you had a guaranteed spot at the Olympics, and then the quotas were filled outside of that.

“What we saw in Tokyo was the world number one qualified but the world number two wasn‘t there.

“It‘s tricky when it’s just one and I guess I get frustrated when I see that in some sports there are reserve athletes who only compete in the heats, then in the finals it’s other athletes.

“But at the end of the day, the Olympic movement needs to be more sustainable and that‘s part of their agenda to be more sustainable so while they might be adding more sports or disciplines into the program, they don’t necessarily add athlete quotas.

“The sport needs to find ways of maximising those athlete quota and countries but I guess a lot of people don‘t realise it’s one per country, one per discipline at the Olympics for our sport, which does make it very cutthroat.”