Of the 12,000 or so spectators who watched Jessica Fox win her second slalom gold of the Paris Games on Wednesday, few are better placed to critique her performance than her father Richard, and the 10-time former slalom world champion loved what he saw.
The 64-year-old spoke to Reuters as his daughter made her way through the TV cameras in the mixed zone at the Vaires-sur-Marne whitewater venue, where she has won both gold medals up for grabs so far in the canoe and kayak single slalom events in stunning style. Second-last to descend the tricky course and with a time of 1:03.54 seconds by Elena Lilik to beat, Fox attacked the course like a dervish, ultimately snatching the gold from the German by nearly 2.5 seconds.
“I was amazed in a way, like humanly, that she had that capability to dig deep enough to go better – and not only go better, to go a lot better,” Fox said. “It’s a hard course, and it’s a good field, and it doesn’t matter how many titles you’ve won before, you’ve got to stay on the wave, basically, and she had an amazing run,” he added.