Not ‘too sweet to play rugby’: Alena Olsen’s Olympic journey

CALEDONIA, Mich. (WOOD) — Alena Olsen has been wowing crowds from a young age. She was a featured soloist at the Grand Rapids Youth Orchestra and Caledonia High School. Nowadays, you will find on the pitch for the U.S. Women’s Rugby Sevens Team.

“I get that all the time. They are like, ‘Oh, you’re too sweet to play rugby,’” Olsen said.

Nobody says that after they meet her on the pitch.

“I know if you talk to my teammates, they don’t think I’m sweet on the field. I’m probably really annoying,” she said. “I want to win. I want to win more than I can breathe.”

Now named to the team headed to compete in the Paris Olympics , she will try to help the U.S. women win a medal in rugby for the first time.

Her road to Paris has been filled with ups and downs. She was cut from the U.S. team that went to Tokyo.

“It’s just a really strong rejection. And that’s going to come in whatever sport you play, whatever level you play — you’re going to get rejection, and it’s going to sting,” Olsen said.

She considered moving on to something else, but it’s not in her nature.

“We are all motivated, but it’s still hard to wake up every day and be like, ‘I want to be better than I was yesterday. I want to put more effort than I put in yesterday.’ It’s hard to show up and do that every day,” Olsen said.

But like when she mastered the violin, Olsen made the decision to maintain that mindset. Her hard work and determination have made her one of the best scrum-backs in the world.

“There are moments where it’s like perfect. You’re playing and you are like, ‘Oh, I have been practicing that and I just did it exactly how I wanted it to be. ‘And the same on the field: These few pure moments of joy where you are like, ‘I have practiced to do that for so long, and we just executed it perfectly,’” Olsen said.

For Olsen, the payoff now is like the perfect bow stroke from her youth. If all goes well in Paris, the song she longs to hear will be a catchy little tune from Francis Scott Key.

“I feel so lucky because it was not something I was planning for, that I had thought out every step of how I wanted to get there. But it’s something that I eventually kind of stumbled into and then created a goal from that,” Olsen said.

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