TJON-A-JOE Renzo

General
TRAINING DURING COVID-19 PANDEMIC
He said he had a hard time adjusting to training alone in Suriname during the COVID-19 pandemic, without his usual partner and friend, Brazilian sprinter Bruno Fratus. “It's been tough since I do enjoy training with Bruno. He's such a professional, and if you see someone like that performing at the top of the world and still showing up every day and pushing himself and me being right beside him through that process, and now it's me having to do that by myself. I know he was used to training alone and that's kind of what I'm learning to do right now. It definitely has a different mental aspect to it, but it is rewarding. I was the kind of swimmer that really liked training alone and just me and my coach in the swimming pool. With him it is different. We have a friendship that goes way back to maybe 2014 or 2015. So if I had to choose someone that was working with me daily then it would be him for sure.” (swimmingworldmagazine.com, 04 Jul 2020)

RETURN TO SURINAME
In 2014 he left Suriname for the United States of America, first to train at Auburn University, and then to study at Harvard University. He returned to Suriname in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “A big reason why I left for the United States was because Suriname just doesn't have the facilities to perform at a high level. And it's not just facilities; it's the structures, the training partners, things like that. Both [Trinidad and Tobago native] Dylan Carter and I had dealt with these same types of issues that we would love to train at home. It's just the infrastructure isn't here and that's why we left. And now that I'm back, I'm again confronted by the challenges that I had prior to leaving in 2014 for that future in swimming.” (swimmingworldmagazine.com, 04 Jul 2020)