KINGSTOWN, St Vincent, CMC—Shafiqua Maloney, who made history by becoming the first Vincentian to advance to the finals of an Olympic event, said that while she did not medal, a loss is when one does not learn anything from the experience.
Maloney, who is based in Arkansas, United States, returned to St. Vincent and the Grenadines (SVG) on Wednesday, reuniting with her mother for the first time in eight years.
She told a welcoming ceremony organised by the government at Argyle International Airport about the pressures she felt during the Paris Olympics. She carried the hopes of her country’s 110,000 residents and an even larger diaspora as the nation dreamed of its first Olympic medal.
Maloney entered the Paris games as the 27th fastest woman in the 800 meters and finished as the fourth.
As she ran in the finals in Paris, she was watched by thousands of Vincentians at a public screening of the race in her nation’s capital, Kingstown, and other parts of the country.
Maloney thanked her sponsors, Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves and his government, and everyone who welcomed her home.
She spoke of the reliance on her Christian faith as she struggled to buy food and pay her rent in the United States on her way to Paris and during the Games there.
“I don’t have to worry about sharing the secret. The secret is out there for everyone. It’s God, and he’s for everyone, so I ain’t gotta hold that secret to myself,” the 25-year-old athlete said during the ceremony.
She said that everyone knows her journey to Paris took work.
“But, eventually, I got some help, and it made a difference mentally, physically, and emotionally for me to see that there were people here who cared about me and the journey and what I’m here trying to do for the country.”
Maloney shocked SVG when she spoke on Jamaica-based sports channel Sportsmax in February about her homelessness last year, her inability to pay her coach, and her struggles to buy food and supplements.
But even after those challenges were overcome by the response of corporate SVG and the government, she had to deal with the mental anxiety that comes with an athlete carrying the hopes and dreams of an entire nation.
“Paris was a little bit nerve-wracking. All year, I ran 1:58 indoors; outdoors, I had only run 1:59,” Maloney said.
She said that going into Paris, other athletes ran between 1:54 and 1:56 in the London Diamond League.
“I called my coach. I was like, ‘Coach, this 1:59 ain’t gonna cut it because everybody out here running fast.’ He was like, ‘You just don’t worry about it.’ I was like, ‘Okay,’” Maloney recounted.
Maloney said she arrived in Paris two weeks before the Olympics and was training hard.
“I’m an overachiever; I’m a perfectionist, and when the coach gives me times in practice, I want to hit my times and run even faster. And I’ve had a whole year of that, even without … the stuff that I needed.”
But when Maloney got to Paris, that overachievement was nowhere to be seen.
“And it came down to Paris, and I wasn’t making the times. And it wasn’t that I was out of shape. I didn’t know what was going on.”
Her coach later explained that she had “loaded up, and it was time to just back off.”
“So I was a little nervous. I’m not gonna lie. I was a little nervous, and I called him crying one night. I was like, ‘Coach, I run next week, and things are not looking too hot.’”
Maloney said her coach reassured her that she was going to be okay.
Inspiration from her Christian faith
“But leading up to Paris, I was in some shoes, and they gave me problems. My Achilles started hurting. I couldn’t walk on both of my feet. My hamstrings were falling apart. Everything was going wrong.”
Maloney said that one day, she went to the polyclinic at the Olympic Village as she did not have a team doctor.
She wanted to get an MRI of her hamstrings. However, when she got to the polyclinic, it was noon, and the next appointment was at 5 p.m.
She returned to her room and, at 4:30 p.m., was getting ready to go to the polyclinic when a Jamaican teammate in Arkansas invited her to a Bible study.
“And I got to the point I hear, Bible study, I’m dropping everything, and I’m going,” she said, adding that she went to the Bible study intending to stay as long as she could before going to the polyclinic.
However, Maloney said she spent all of the time at the Bible study without going to the polyclinic.
“…But when I got back to my room, all my pain had gone, and that was the first time I realized that God was with me out there.”
Nonetheless, Maloney had to deal with her nerves.
“It’s the Olympics. It’s my second time here; I have sponsors, and the country looks at me. I was getting a bit nervous,” Maloney said, adding that she drew strength from Deuteronomy 1:29-31.
Losing builds character
The athlete said that her coach told her she needed to be in the top three ahead of the heats.
“I remember coming off that turn, and I think I was in, like, fifth … And I shifted gears. The next thing I know, I was in third.”
Maloney noted that she was boxed in during the race.
“I don’t know how I always get boxed in, but I realized you’ll lose when you run. You have to lose; it builds character, and you learn. If you learn something from the races you lose, you never really lose.”
She noted that she lost in the two meets she contested in Europe before the Paris Olympics.
“I lost my 800 in Hengelo. I was boxed in, panicked, and . to come out of the box and jus, but it interrupted my rhythm and everything.”
She said that when she was boxed in in Paris, she remembered that Hengelo experience.
“So I stayed patient and I figured something on the inside was gonna open up, and it did.”
Maloney said that there were 24 athletes in the semi-finals in Paris, and she had to be among the top two.
“I realized the girls that I would be running with, but I had that mentality. I don’t care what you ran before you came here; you must be ready when you step on this line. And again, I got boxed in. And I think, like 120 meters to go, I called on the Lord because I didn’t know what else would happen.
“And as soon as I did that, a path opened, and I felt like a breeze pushing me down the street. Looking at the race, you see me just going by everybody. … I was in disbelief. I was just like, in those two races, I was out there, like, ‘God is with me out here.’”
She said that going into the finals, she again drew on Deuteronomy 1:29-31.
“And I just, like, God didn’t bring me this far to leave me.”
Maloney said that in 2023, she did not have what she needed to get a massage but never got injured while training.
“[I] was always able to go back into practice. I might be in pain, whatever the case is, but I was always able to go back into practice and do whatever I needed to do,” she said.
And so, during the finals, Maloney said she was thinking, “God didn’t carry me through all of that. He didn’t put me in a position to make the stand and bring me all the way to Paris to leave me here. And so I had to trust that going into the finals.”
The medal was ‘right there every time.’
She wished she had medalled, adding, “It was right there every time.
“I don’t like looking at the race because I’m reminded of how close I was to getting a medal. But after the race, I lay on the ground in disbelief, like, ‘The medal was right there.’
During the Paris Olympics, Maloney responded to repeated questions from the media about her homelessness last year.
“Everybody had known my story by then, and every time I get done running, they want to know.”
She said it “hurt” talking about the experience because it had been a lot to go through.
“… Nobody wants to be homeless and going through all the things that I [had been] going through,” Maloney said, adding that she cried after each race and media reaction.
“I went to the coach, and I cried. And he was like, ‘Why are you crying?’ Sometimes, it was tears of joy, and sometimes, it was just like, ‘I’m tired of answering the same questions and just reliving that moment.’
“But in the finals, when I got up off the ground, and I went up to the media folks, and they asked me about it again, it was the first time I felt peace and joy about the situation because then I realized if all that hadn’t happened I wouldn’t have been where I was at that time.
“I had to be homeless to meet the people I had to meet, to get closer to God and trust Him in the season and the coming storm.
“And so, after the finals, I just took some time to appreciate how far I came and what I could achieve. And I didn’t come home with a gold medal, but, you know, I got God, and that’s all I need. And I’m looking forward to 2028 to get the medal I missed. It’s on my mind. It is on my mind.”
Working towards LA28
Maloney said that before Los Angeles 2028, she had other meets, including the World Championships next year.
“So I’m taking it one day at a time, one year at a time, and just focusing on what’s next and right in front of me. I can’t be in 2024 thinking about 2028. I gotta do all the things that I gotta do now to make sure I get there, healthy and able to do what I have planned to do, and that is to get my medal that I missed out on.
“And it’s gonna take me continuing to, you know, believing in God and just trusting in his plans for me. Hopefully, all my sponsors will still be there with me, going through this journey.
“And thank you guys, for everyone for welcoming me back, my family; happy to see my mom and my dad and … I feel the love and all the appreciation,” she said.
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