Terry Manier is confident he’ll be the loudest fan during the 2016 Rio Olympics. He’ll be cheering for the “World’s Greatest Athlete,” Ashton Eaton and wife and fellow Olympian, Brianne Eaton. Terry first met Ashton last year while shooting an editorial on Ashton and his mom. After the photos were published, Ashton approached Terry about getting some of the photos printed. As the two got talking, Terry learned that Ashton and his wife would be needing some photos for a fan site they were working on. This became Terry’s personal project that has continued to this day.
Ashton gets the title “World’s Greatest Athlete” because he holds the world record in the decathlon and the heptathlon, and after he broke the world record for decathlete points, he then broke his own record. Brianne Eaton, also an Olympic athlete, competes in both the pentathlon and the heptathlon, and holds the Canadian record for the Heptathlon. The pairs’ training schedule is of course tight, so Terry designed his shoots to coincide with breaks in their training.
Terry travels between the athletes’ two training locations, Santa Barbara, California and Eugene, Oregon. Weeks before each shoot, he plans which shots he wants to get, combining ideas from existing Olympic athlete shots and Ashton and Brianne’s requests. On the day of the shoots, the athletes’ coach, Harry Marra, gives Terry their training schedules for the day. Terry says that originally, the majority of the photographs were taken in the breaks in their schedules. “If Ashton was about to do the high jump, I would go set up for the photograph I wanted in between his jumps,” he says. For the latest shoot, the three decided to do something off-track and a bit sportier. They shot in the couple’s current training location, Eugene.
Terry says the best part of the project was always just getting to know Brianne and Ashton. “Both are simply the best people,” he says, and as the photography project progressed, he became one of their biggest fans, as well as a personal friend. Whenever he can, he attends their races to catch the two in action and cheer them on.
When Terry initially started shooting the Eatons, the style was outside of his usual scope. While he had shot athletes before, most of his portraits were sitting. To photograph a body running by at 20 mph was something new.
This pushed me a bit outside the box—a challenge I welcomed. Getting out of my every day setup was great, as I added to my knowledge of what to do and what not to do.
Now, Terry has shot the Olympians in all different settings—in action during shoots, candid in races, and posed. The photos are used all across the Eaton website, weareeaton.com, and they’ll be adding material from this latest round of photos soon. The Olympian photos have also become a component of Terry’s own portfolio.