U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee gets massive $10 million gift
Donations to the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee can help athletes train and compete, maybe…
Donations to the U.S. Olympic and Paralympic Committee can help athletes train and compete, maybe even win a medal someday.
Yucca and Gary Rieschel’s latest gift will help save lives.
The Rieschels are donating $10 million to be used to bolster the USOPC’s mental health program. It follows the couple’s $1.5 million donation for the same purpose in 2020, which was used to hire additional staff psychologists and psychiatrists and create a registry of local providers for athletes.
“It is a bloody epidemic in the United States,” Gary Rieschel told USA TODAY Sports. “… This is a step toward addressing what I think is a problem for this next generation that we literally all have to work to solve. Whether it’s an athlete, whether it’s someone that’s a teacher or a nurse, you should know it’s OK to seek help.
“If part of this messaging reduces that stigma, that’s where we want to be.”
Athlete mental health, particularly that of Olympic athletes and hopefuls, has taken on greater urgency in recent years. High-profile athletes such as Michael Phelps and Naomi Osaka have opened up about their mental health struggles, and Simone Biles was forced to skip most of her events at the Tokyo Olympics after her anxiety manifested in a case of the “twisties,” causing her to lose sense of where she was in the air.
But the Rieschels were concerned long before 2020.
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Sports as a tool
Gary Rieschel is a venture capitalist whose Qiming Venture Partners invests in technology and health care companies, and his family is active in philanthropy. When Yucca and Gary worked with the Big Sky Youth Empowerment Project, which uses outdoor activities to help vulnerable teens, they saw firsthand the mental health crisis developing among young people. They also saw how sports could be used as a tool to address the issue.
Hearing Phelps speak in 2016 solidified their thoughts.
“He was willing to talk about the struggles he had, and they were real,” Gary Rieschel said. “I watched how people reacted to that and could see the power in that. If we could get the athletes to reduce the stigma of seeking help, it could save an awful lot of people.”
More:‘People just need to be heard:’ Simone Biles and Naomi Osaka on mental health in 2021 and beyond
More:Simone Biles is an inspiration, whether competing or ‘pushing mental health to the forefront’
Already Olympic fans – the couple attended their first Games in 2002 in Salt Lake City and also went to Beijing in 2008, Sochi in 2014 and Rio in 2016 – the Rieschels reached out to the USOPC about donating money with the specific intent it be used to address mental health.
The USOPC had had sports psychologists on staff, but their expertise was mostly related to athlete performance. It was becoming increasingly clear staff with mental health backgrounds were needed, a need that exploded when the COVID-19 pandemic hit.
The Tokyo Olympics were delayed by a year, and both those Games and the Winter Olympics in Beijing were held under strict quarantine measures and without fans. Athletes found themselves unable to train or training in environments vastly different from what they were used to. Some lost their jobs and sources of funding.
Some lost family members.
The Rieschels’ initial donation enabled the USOPC to hire psychologists and psychiatrists specializing in mental health. There’s now a 24-hour hotline that connects Team USA athletes with licensed mental health professionals from anywhere in the world. For those who prefer to seek resources on their own, there’s a registry with more than 200 local providers.
Since 2020, the USOPC has had 1,700 interactions with athletes for mental health services. The number of athletes who’ve used the available services is likely greater than that, given the USOPC doesn’t know when athletes access the hotline and the registry.
“It has been incredibly impactful,” said Amber Donaldson, the USOPC’s vice president of sports medicine. “I don’t say this lightly: we’ve been able to save lives because of the (Rieschels’) gifts and the resources we’ve been able to put in place because of it.”
Where the money will go
The Rieschels’ new donation, the largest standalone gift in the USOPC Foundation’s 10-year history, will allow the USOPC to greatly expand its programs.
“We’re treating across the spectrum, from performance to mental health,” Donaldson said. “We want to be able to provide services and make a touch with every Team USA athlete. And some athletes may not need our services at this point, but we want to make sure they know what’s available.”
The USOPC also wants to make sure those who interact with athletes know what’s available.
Few national governing bodies have the network of support services for mental health as they do a roster of general practitioners, orthopedists and physical therapists. And it’s even more unlikely for individual coaches, local gym owners and parents.
Donaldson mentioned a first aid-like program that teaches NGBs, coaches, parents and athletes how to identify mental health issues, talk with someone who is struggling and know what resources are available. Almost 700 people have already gone through the training, Donaldson said, and they want to be able to offer it to everyone associated with Team USA.
“Just like CPR, it’s important for all of us to be able to recognize that someone is not OK and that we can help them,” Donaldson said.
Because, ultimately, the Rieschels want their gift to have a positive impact on society as a whole.
Why it matters
Whether it is athletes erasing the stigma surrounding mental health, or people at the grassroots level benefitting from the education and resources the USOPC has provided, the Rieschels hope helping Team USA athletes will help everyone.
“Famous (athletes) certainly have a significant role to play. But I think the broader role is the thousands of Olympians and aspiring Olympic athletes,” Rieschel said. “They have all the same issues but they don’t have sponsors, they don’t have that kind of visibility. Them talking to a high school assembly, them talking at a Boys and Girls club in Massachusetts, just making themselves available – to have those conversations could be incredibly valuable.”
The Rieschels know this large of a donation to the USOPC means the family won’t be able to fund other organizations addressing other important needs. But that’s how strongly they feel about addressing mental health.
“This,” Gary Rieschel said, “is front and center for everyone in our family.”
Follow USA TODAY Sports columnist Nancy Armour on Twitter @nrarmour.
