Athletes around the world are eager to get back to what they love most, playing sports, and that includes one paralympian from Fairfield. Matt Stutzman is an armless archer who has been training to compete at the 2020 Tokyo Paralympics, but now will have an extra year to train for the worldwide event. Even though his Olympic career is the main source of income, Stutzman remains optimistic and tells KCII News how the postponement has led to some much needed family time, “So the oldest is 14, then we have 13, and a 7-year-old and they’re all boys. And they love it. We are constantly doing stuff in the country and on the lake. Even right now they are all sitting around the fire eating sandwiches we made and we are probably going fishing later on. Actually, the youngest one made a comment that he wishes that I could still do what I did but still have the same amount of time that I have now. Because then it’s more time to spend with him just doing life things really.” 

Stutzman understands the struggles athletes like him are going through, but he gave some advice on what to do during this downtime, “This whole thing has taught us to slow down and just enjoy life a little bit. I can tell you from my perspective, I was probably traveling two times a month and probably one of those was international so I’m gone for literally half the month and on the road. So you see your kids for like 14 days out of the month. Now, you get to spend that time with them. What is happening is it has slowed everyone down to the point where you are at your house and you are enjoying your life and your family because that’s what we do. What we do is because we want to take care of our family, so now we get that opportunity to do that and enjoy it and not worry too much about what’s going to happen later on because we don’t’ know and can’t control it.” The 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics were postponed to 2021 and Stutzman believes the event will be a hair-raising event to behold. The International Olympic Committee extended the late qualifying date for athletes to qualify for their respective sports to June of 2021.