Canoe Slalom wasn’t meant to be part of the schedule at the Sydney 2000 Olympics. If it hadn’t been, Jess and Noemie Fox would never have paddled for Australia and won gold. It was the fight to keep canoe slalom in the Games and to fund a whitewater venue in Penrith, that brought Richard and Miriam Fox to Australia more than 25 years ago, along with their now-famous daughters. Jess is now the greatest paddler in the sport’s history, and Noemie also an Olympic champion, but if Richard hadn’t rallied to find the funding, the Fox’s never would have migrated Down Under. “That’s what brought us here. That’s the beginning of the story. In 1996, after the Atlanta Games, the minister of the Olympics at the time, Michael Knight, decided they wouldn’t build the whitewater venue [in Sydney] and host the slalom events,” Richard said.