NBC Connecticut's “Road to Paris” counts down the days until the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris and highlights local athletes who will represent Connecticut on the world stage this summer.

From July 1 to 22, every Monday at 5 p.m., we will introduce you to one of these athletes who make the state proud.

There are more than two dozen athletes with Connecticut ties to keep an eye on, but few cover the state in quite the same way as Jess Savner, an Olympic debutante from Bethlehem.

“Think back to your childhood and ask yourself: What was that crazy dream you had?” Jess Savner compares it to the desire to become a pop star or an astronaut.

“Imagine if this dream came true,” Savner said.

That day is today.

Savner's dream of becoming an Olympian was neither far-fetched nor something that happened overnight.

“Training for five sports is not for the faint of heart,” said Savner.

You heard right: five sports.

The Bethlehem native is going to her first games as a modern pentathlete. That includes running, shooting, swimming, show jumping and fencing.

It is a list that Savner has presented many times.

“I practiced it, I rehearsed it,” Savner said with a smile.

After rattling off the list of events, Savner's next trick is to list the training locations.

“I spend so much time in the car,” Savner said. “I lift weights in Simsbury. I ride horses in Woodbury. I swim in Cheshire. And then I fence here in Woodbridge and in New York City. Sometimes I'm in three of those places in the same day.”

No matter how long these lists may be, they all started with one thing.

“I started out riding horses,” Savner said. “I grew up with horses on my property and had two parents who rode.”

In fact, Savner said, all you have to do is try going to a barn in Connecticut where no one knows her mother.

“The biggest compliment I get to this day is when I'm on horses and they say, 'Oh my God, you look so much like your mother.' It feels like I'm taking them with me,” Savner said.
Her father is also there.

After attending Central Connecticut State University, where she holds a record in pole vaulting, Savner next turned her attention to her father's sport.

“My father was a triathlete, so it was a natural progression,” Savner said.

Besides running, swimming and cycling, which sports have you now introduced into play, including fencing and shooting?

“It wasn’t my idea,” Savner said.

At the age of 21, while most Olympic athletes have been focused on their sport for years, Savner wanted to try something new.

“Usually you don't start playing sports at this time in your life and you don't get really good at it, but everything felt new and exciting,” Savner said. “I was able to really appreciate a lot of it because there were so many firsts for me.”

Appreciation and respect – these two are at the top of Savner’s list of keys to success.

“Respect for every sport is important,” Savner said. “You come here to train fencing… At this moment, I'm not a pentathlete, I'm a fencer.”

She is a runner, swimmer, rider, shooter, pentathlete and Olympian every day.

A long list of dreams that isn't all that far-fetched.

“There's no emotion you can describe,” Savner said, trying to find the right word. “Like someone calling you and saying, 'Hey, you're going to the moon next week. Would you be excited?' No. It's incredible.”