First Time Olympians Series

Welcome to our new profile series highlighting Ontario's first time Olympic and Paralympic qualifiers who will be in Paris this summer.

Finding the drive to excel during periods of uncertainty and maximizing productivity as an athlete, all while juggling a wave of personal issues, can often be quite a load to handle for just about anyone.

Apollo Hess knows all about it – the hardship, apprehensiveness and tenseness that can get in the way. Also, the negatively that can drain and affect years of working to fulfill a dream.

For the 21-year-old, it has been finding resilience to counter the challenges of his goals.

A determined individual, passionate about swimming, life hasn’t been easy for him. Setbacks have, from time to time, led him to doubting many things that even included his ability to reach the podium of success. It’s one that comes with triumph in competitions.

Motivation, both personal and from coaches and friends, has been a huge factor in his ability to get over some of those setbacks. It has changed his life for the better.

So has the dream that came true – qualifying, earning and being chosen to Canada’s team that will compete in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris.

In May, at the Canadian Olympic Trials hosted by the Toronto Pan Am Sports Centre (TPASC), Hess won a silver medal in the 100-metres breaststroke. He was clocked at one minute, 99 one-hundredths of a second.

In addition to his performance being a personal best, it was enough to have those charged with selecting Canada’s team, give him an optimistic nod that he was invited to the world’s premier sports competition set for France in August.

But that selection didn’t happen right away.

“I was very happy with my performance, but at the same time frustrated that I initially missed the team and my ultimate dream,” said Hess, when asked what came to mind after he completed the race and waited for team selection. “There were some tense moments, but I was happy with my race. It was the swim of my life - and it has changed my life.”

Calm and relaxed in the pool, which is usually the opposite to what an athlete faces with nerves galore and a boisterous crowd, Hess was also confident in his ability. He was focussed poolside, adamant and uncompromising. For the record, his time was a microscopic 0.33 seconds from guaranteeing him a spot to Paris.

Hess had to play the waiting game. It wasn’t until the final day of the Trials, a period of time that seemed to drag on, that he learned his name was picked for the Olympics.

Happiness had come after the dismay and uneasiness of being disqualified in the 200-metres breaststroke – something that he didn’t want to talk about.

“There had been talk of me as an alternate on a relay team, but all I could do was wait – and it was four days of stress mixed with hope. There was a period when I thought I had missed my dream.”

But Hess vividly recalls getting a text on his phone to meet his coach in the late afternoon at the TPASC pool. Jitters and agitation mixed with panic and a variety of emotions, time couldn’t come quick enough for the session.

“I was told I made the Canadian team and was going to the Olympics,” said Hess. “I broke down in tears. There was a feeling I can’t explain. Even now, I feel like I was in a dream and waiting to wake up.”

Hess will swim in a relay event. As part of the requirements, he will need to compete in a preliminary relay race. Which one has yet to be determined, but it could be either the mixed 4x100-metres medley relay or the men’s 4x100-metres medley relay.

Having his share of roadblocks, Hess was crystal clear about the road ahead.

“I still have way more in the tank and lots to learn,” he said. “This is an opportunity that will sit with me for the rest of my life.”

Home for Hess is Lethbridge, Alta. – a city near Canada’s Rocky Mountains and categorized as “a thriving hub for adventure, agriculture, heritage, history and cuisine”. Add to that, a city that can boast Hess being a first time Olympian in swimming.

Hess is proud of his Indigenous background. He is a member of the Kainai Nation, also known as the Blood Tribe, which is located in southern Alberta. He may also be one of the first Indigenous swimmers to make a Canadian Olympic team.

As a student at the University of Lethbridge, he’s finished his third year of studies. Looking ahead, after getting his degree, Hess is tinkering with a career choice as a paramedic or firefighter. Working in real estate is also in the picture. Raised by a single mom, swim lessons started when he was six years old with the Excalibur Swim Club.

“I hated swim lessons and really wanted to play hockey and soccer,” said Hess. “My mother had other plans – and swimming it was.”

At the age of 21, around the time when Hess was trying to deal with some social challenges, he made move to Toronto in 2023 and got involved with the High-Performance Centre in Ontario. Located at TPASC, it is supported by a partnership group made up of Swim Ontario, Canadian Sport Institute Ontario (CSIO), the University of Toronto and Swimming Canada.

“I was surrounded by some great people and saw that my times in Ontario were so much better – especially in long course swimming,” said Hess. “But things didn’t go well in 2023 and I did poorly at the championship Trials in April and again at the U.S. Open in Greensboro, N.C., last December.”

Dedicated coaching can be a huge bonus for an athlete.

Hess has huge admiration for Peter Schori, a former member of the Canadian coaching staff at the World championships. Schori is the head coach and director of swimming for the University of Lethbridge Longhorns.

“(Schori) has been like a fatherly figure to me,” said Hess, who chose university in his hometown and right out of high school. “This man has guided me and made me a better swimmer and person. I have learned so many life lessons from him.”

While competing for the University of Lethbridge, where he was chosen the 2022 Rookie of the Year in swimming in Canadian university sport, Hess won five medals at the USports championships.

With his silver medal in the 100-metres breaststroke, he was Lethbridge’s first medallist at the Canadian university championships since 2005. In the 50-metres breaststroke, he set a Canadian short course record. In 2023, Hess finished third in both the 50-metres and 100-metres breaststroke events at the USports Championships.

A month before the Canadian Olympic Trials, Hess competed at the Canadian Open – also in Toronto. His time in the preliminaries of the 100-metres breaststroke was 1:02.24. However, in the final, it was six-tenths of a second slower and he placed sixth.

David Grossman is a veteran multi award-winning Journalist and Broadcaster with some of Canada’s major media, including the Toronto Star and SPORTSNET 590 THE FAN, and a Public Relations professional for 50+ years in Canadian sports and Government relations.