Tucson resident ready for Paris Olympics BMX competition

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It takes a village to make an athlete a success at the Olympics. Coaches push, facility managers open doors at odd hours, and coaches suffer almost as many sleepless nights as the athlete.

To be an Olympian, you need an ecosystem.

For Daleny Vaughn, a Team USA BMX rider and Tucson native, her ecosystem is closer to home.

Tucson native Dalaney Vaughn began competing in BMX at a young age. She is now set to compete in the Paris Olympics. (Photo courtesy of Daleny Vaughn)

Her parents, Julie and Kirk Vaughn, have supported her throughout her life in her development through the sport. Her home track is Tucson Sports Park BMX and the owners and facility managers who have allowed her the training hours…are also Julie and Kirk Vaughn.

“I don’t know if I would be where I am today if I didn’t have the opportunity that they had the track,” said Daleny, 23. “I think it allowed me to get a lot better on my bike and learn a lot of skills and it gave me an opportunity that not a lot of people have.”

From August 1, they will have the chance to see her perform as an Olympian when she competes in the Paris Olympics at the BMX stadium in Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines.

Thanks to her older brother Dylon, Daleny’s first experience with cycling was faster than most. She was set free on a bike and never looked back.

“She started racing when she was 3,” Kirk said. “She was out in our front yard at one of our houses and she had training wheels on her bike. I looked out and her older brother took the training wheels off and was pushing her down the street. I thought, ‘Oh my God.’ We went out there running and she was pedaling. And from then on, she was always there.”

As she got older, Daleny began learning new jumps and taking on new challenges against her friends and others, not only at the BMX park, but also in the family’s backyard, where they had a mini-track. Although she had the opportunity to compete against more experienced riders at a younger age than most, her learning process wasn’t as traditional as others.

She learned by losing.

A strong motivation

Even when she failed, it never dampened her love for the sport. Rather, it fueled an ultra-competitive spirit that would become the backbone of her future success.

“She just had a drive and a motivation from the moment she started racing that’s just different than a lot of other drivers,” Kirk said. “She was just motivated. She always had confidence in herself. She’d go out there and be blown away and she’d come back and be like, ‘I’m going to win the next round.'”

For Daleny, it wasn’t so much self-confidence as it was a fundamental refusal to accept failure.

“I’m a pretty bad loser,” Daleny said. “I don’t like to lose. I guess I just want to win and I don’t want anything else.”

Despite the losses and especially the victories, it is a feeling she experiences while cycling that keeps Daleny coming back to the bike.

“It’s such an adrenaline rush,” she said. “We’re going from bar to bar down an 8-meter hill with seven other runners on the runway. You have to be as physically fit as you can be. It also challenges me more because it’s something you have to work on and just be at your best if you want to win.”

At the age of 18, Daleny decided to turn pro in 2020. Since that decision, she has been on a roll. She podiumed in her first elite race, won the Grand Nationals, is a NAG 5 Challenge winner, and was a bronze medalist at the UCI 2024 World Championships, cementing her spot on Team USA’s Olympic roster in Paris.

Vaughn failed to qualify for the 2021 Olympics after just one year as a professional BMX rider. Four years later, the moment Vaughn finally achieved a lifelong goal was surreal for the rider who was practically born behind the wheel.

“I felt like I was in a dream,” Daleny said. “(The) 2024 Olympics was) always the goal. It was something I had been striving for for years and that it would pay off and that all my sacrifices and everything was worth it. It was just an unreal feeling that’s hard to describe, honestly.”

It wasn’t just Daleny who was overcome with the euphoric feeling of accomplishment. Her ever-present support system was also bathed in the euphoria of that moment.

“When she finished third (at the world championships), we knew she was locked into the Olympics,” Julie said. “I can’t even tell you the feeling. We knew right then that the last three years had paid off, because we knew right then that she was going to the Olympics. So that was a pretty big moment.”

A family trip

Daleny Vaughn said when she competed in Paris, “I want to put on as many blinders as possible to show that it’s the Olympics.” (Photo courtesy of Daleny Vaughn)

Daleny’s story would not be complete without the contributions of her parents, who did everything for her. They gave her and many others their own track to train on.

Her father, Kirk, began racing in his hometown of Kansas City at age 14. He met Julie in high school, and she began watching her now-husband race at area tracks. What began as a place to bond for the young Midwest couple became a cornerstone of their life together.

In 2018, they opened a track in Kansas City, Raytown BMX, and that gave the Vaughns the connections that would lead them to Arizona: USA BMX has a location in the Phoenix area.

“They flew us out to Phoenix and gave us the details, tickets to the local tracks in that area and showed us how to run a track, all the ins and outs,” Kirk said.

Shortly after that trip, Kirk, who works full-time at LeoLabs, a company specializing in space safety and security, particularly in low Earth orbit, was offered a job in Tucson. The seeds were planted in near-perfect conditions for what has become Tucson Sports Park BMX.

“So we jumped on, packed up the bus and left,” Kirk said. “Before we got here, the people who ran the local (BMX) track in Tucson had closed it down.

“Once we got here … (USA BMX) called us and said we should reopen the track. (We) moved here in 1999 and then about six months later in 2000, we reopened the local track and started running it. We’ve been running it ever since.”

That the opportunity arose in Tucson made sense. Former pro cyclists like one of Daleny’s mentors, former Olympian Richard Rogers, helped turn southern Arizona into a hotbed for pro cyclists of all disciplines. The city’s cycling culture flourished in the warmer weather, which lent itself to the possibility of year-round training regimens, along with the example of Rogers and others.

“I think it’s a combination of being able to race year-round and being able to train,” Kirk said. “Richard Rogers is family to us. He’s a two-time Olympian. He’s here in Tucson. He was a big influence on Daleny growing up, he helped her out a lot, so he’s always been there. He’s always made people in Tucson realize that it’s possible to..”

Vision for the future

Julie supported starting her own track in Tucson. She shared her husband’s passion for the sport and soon their children did too.

“We had two kids at the time,” Julie said. “Our oldest, my son, was racing. I liked the sport, and I liked that it was a family aspect and the friends we had and everything, so I was fine with it.”

Julie, a stay-at-home mom, handled most of the administrative tasks needed to run the rink, such as answering phone calls and organizing. A team of Kirk, other volunteers, and Vaughn’s children maintain the rink.

“I gave Daleny the summer off because she’s going to the Olympics,” Kirk said, laughing. “I said, ‘OK, you get the summer off, but then you have to go back to work.'”

No Vaughn child is exempt from working on the track. Even those not involved in BMX are expected to contribute to the cause.

“It’s a family business,” Julie said. “Our middle daughter never raced. She danced and cheered and she’s still a big part of the (track maintenance).”

Daleny is a superstitious rider. If she does well in her first races before a final, everything that led up to those races that day needs to be repeated. That goes for everything and everyone involved in the Vaughn camp, from spectator clothing to the location of her toilet breaks.

“I’ve tried to keep everything as close together as possible on race day,” Daleny said. “If I do well in the first race and I use a specific toilet cubicle, I’ll just keep going to that one specific cubicle. I told my parents to wear the same outfits (in Paris) that they wore at the world championships when I qualified.”

By the time Daleny takes her starting block on the hill at the Saint-Quentin-en-Yvelines BMX stadium in Montigny-le-Bretonneux, France, she will be racing for more than her own ambition. She will be racing for Kirk and Julie, who served as trainers, motivators, track operators and parents rolled into one, and she will be doing it in front of the world.

But in those precious seconds before the gate drops and the race begins, silence and focus will define the Tucson native. She said she will refuse to let the moment overtake her and what she has trained her entire life to do.

“It’s just going to be blinders on,” Daleny said. “I’m not focusing too much on (the fact that) it’s the Olympics. I don’t want that added pressure. I just want to make it like any other race. Going to the Olympic Village is going to be a bit of a surreal feeling. Once race day comes, I want to put as many blinders on as possible to realize that it’s the Olympics, just to use that to my advantage and try not to panic too much.”

Her family will be there, as always, to support her.

“I’m sure it’s going to be a very emotional time to hear her name called at the Olympics,” Kirk said. “It’s more about knowing, not so much that she’s an Olympian, which is great, but the amount of work that you put in, the drive and everything that she’s done to earn that spot is the biggest thing that’s going to make it all really special.”

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