Members of the audience ask Marine Corps Lt. Riley Tejcek, Ms. Military 2023, for a personal photo during the Southern California Air Show 2023 on April 23, 2023, at March Reserve Air Base in Riverside, Calif. (CJ Creary/452nd Air Mobility Wing Public Affairs)
WASHINGTON — When the COVID-19 pandemic hit in 2020, U.S. Marine Corps logistics officer 1st Lt. Riley Tejcek still had a competitive itch.
Tejcek, a four-year softball player at George Washington University, had been a Marine for a few years when sports shut down, but she did not let that break her spirit. She took inspiration from Elana Meyers Taylor, another former GW softball player and five-time Olympic medalist, and broke into the world of bobsled.
Now, Tejcek, 26, is trying to become the first active-duty female Marine in the Olympics, but it will take a lot of training between now and 2026, when the Games will take over Milan, Italy.
“It takes everything I have for three hours of training a day, and then constantly competing against my peers, who don’t have a job, who definitely aren’t serving, who have that flexibility to be an athlete full time, when it’s something I have to balance part time,” Tejcek said this week at the Modern Day Marine Expo in Washington.
Riley Tejcek, 26, is trying to become the first active-duty female Marine in the Olympics. “It takes everything I have for three hours of training a day, and then constantly competing against my peers, who don’t have a job, who definitely aren’t serving, who have that flexibility to be an athlete full time, when it’s something I have to balance part time,” Tejcek said this week at the Modern Day Marine Expo in Washington. (Screen shot from video taken by Ken-Yon Hardy/Stars and Stripes)
Tejcek is still trying to figure out that balance every day, she said.
“Something that I work really hard on is trying to have an active balance, over-communicate and train my men and women as a team to be able to know that, ‘Hey, you guys can operate when I’m not there,’ ” Tejcek said. “How can I operate away from you guys, which is simulating almost a war situation, where I can’t be eyes-on all the time.”
In addition to her military and bobsledding endeavors, Tejcek also entered and won the 2023 Ms. Military Pageant. It was not about how contestants looked, she said, but what they were doing for the military community.
While she was stationed at Camp Pendleton in Southern California, Tejcek was involved in all kinds of faith-based projects aimed to support local youth, in the U.S. and Mexico.
“I like to wear several different hats,” Tejcek said. “I like to be able to put my hair up in a bun and be a Marine, right? I like to wear it down with the crown, and I like to flip back and tuck it under my helmet and just be a competitor. So everything that I do I want to compete. I want to be the best version of myself. I want to represent my country in all aspects and spheres and be a role model for young women.”
A native of Carmel, Ind., Tejcek is stationed at Marine Corps Base Quantico, where she works as a support officer at the Expeditionary Warfare School. The base is about 35 miles southwest of Washington, D.C., where she always saw herself being.
“I wanted to be where things were happening,” Tejcek said. “I wanted to push policy. I didn’t think I wanted to be a Marine. I think that I wanted to work for the government and help with counterterrorism, but now it all meshed together and I’m exactly where I’m supposed to be.”
