Dolores Moreira is a Uruguayan who rents a boat to compete in the Paris Olympics 2024. She tows it across Europe.

The 25-year-old Moreira (also known as Lola) will be representing Uruguay at the third Olympic Games this summer.

Since her Olympic debut in Rio de Janeiro at age 16, she has traveled across South America with a dinghy on the roof of her vehicle to compete regionally.

It's not new to rent a boat in Barcelona and drive it to Marseille for a lower cost.

"I drove with the boat on top for days and days to make it easier to access and to travel to more championships, and to perfect my technique," Moreira said at the La Estacada Yacht club in Montevideo. The club overlooks a vast estuary.

According to figures filed by the Internal Revenue Service of the United States in 2021, South America and Caribbean received the least amount of funding from the International Olympic Committee for athlete grants compared to any other region.

South America's national sports budgets are dominated by football, the continent's most popular and lucrative sport.

Moreira, a native of Paysandu, a riverside district north-west from the capital's centre, said that there were no high-level competitions for sailing in Uruguay.

She said that to improve, "you must constantly travel abroad", which means expenses accumulate.

Liber Garcia, a director of the Olympic Committee in Uruguay and a banker from Montevideo, is one of its directors. Garcia said that in Uruguay, a country with 3.4 million people, "everything, including the (Olympics) leadership, is amateur."

The director will be taking a leave of absence in July, along with 13 other directors, to attend the Games. They will all cover their own travel costs.

Uruguay has set aside less that two million dollars for an entire team in Paris. Despite the financial challenges, 27 athletes from nine different sports will compete.

Garcia stated that "this speaks volumes about the grit, resilience and great value of our athletes."

A new law that was passed last year requires that the Uruguayan central government allocate approximately one million dollars per annum to the National Secretariat of Sport to support athletes and coaches.

Budgets in France and other countries are measured in tens of million of euros.

The federations would be able to prepare better for the Games if they had a mandate that included more resources. This, Garcia said, put the country "in a much better position than it was before. However, this is still not enough."

Break with Past Games

Guillermo Lijtenstein, 33, was lifting weights at a local practice ground as part of the warm-up for a rugby team.

Lijtenstein, a physiotherapist, said that financial support was very important. He claimed that he had to juggle matches, early morning training sessions and work hours during his decade-long career as a sportsman.

Los Teros Sevens, a team that has been a part of the high-performance circuit since 2022 and is attracting sponsors, qualified as the first Uruguayan rugby team for Paris.

Lijtenstein stated, "We used to give a little extra and not think so much about the economic aspect, which I believe characterises Uruguayan athletes."

This year marks the first time that prize money will be awarded to Olympic champions of athletics, as a symbolical break from previous games.

Other international federations criticized World Athletics' decision to award $50,000 for each gold medalist in April, but athletes were generally pleased.

She said that if a $50,000 gold medal was offered, it would be enough to support a half-year's worth of training in Uruguay.

Diego Ardao (28), the captain of the team, who was leading warm-up at the rugby field, wasn't convinced that a financial reward would change local attitudes towards Games, even though he was generally in favor of the reward.

Ardao stated that "everyone who competes here does so for transcendental reasons rather than money." "More to feel proud of representing your country", as his team gets to say this season. I played in the Olympic Games." (Reporting and editing by Clare Fallon; Lucinda Elliot)