{"id":4646,"date":"2026-02-23T08:37:11","date_gmt":"2026-02-23T14:37:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/?p=4646"},"modified":"2026-02-24T10:23:30","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T16:23:30","slug":"life-on-the-circuit-with-maggie-ewen-february-2026-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/?p=4646","title":{"rendered":"Life on the circuit with Maggie Ewen: March, 2026 edition."},"content":{"rendered":"
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World class putter Maggie Ewen<\/a> will be filing monthly reports as she travels the world plying her trade. In this piece, Maggie gives McThrows readers insight into life on the road as a professional putter.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

If you\u2019re a fan of the professional circuit, I’m betting you\u2019ve noticed throwers always seem to be traveling. <\/strong>Sometimes even multiple countries and competitions within the span of a week. It\u2019s true the life of a professional athlete is filled with travel. That\u2019s because there\u2019s simply more opportunity outside of the United States. Meets are contested more frequently in Europe and there is greater general appreciation for track and field overseas.  Even a relatively small throws only meet will have a packed stadium. The pay is better in Europe as well. So, yeah, we want to be over there as much as possible!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve been a professional thrower <\/em>
for eight years and the <\/em>
travel aspect was definitely <\/em>
a learning curve. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I\u2019m accustomed to the system now. I\u2019d like to give you a snapshot of  that system in the hopes you\u2019ll get a better picture of our lives on the road as professional throwers. Most athletes will have a system that looks very similar but as with all things, there are outliers. With that being said, lets get into it!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The first thing you need to know is that most meets will not host a full program. <\/strong>They\u2019ll cherry pick the events they want and the genders they want competing in those events. At that point it\u2019s my job to look through all the meets that will be contested through the year to find the ones that will have women\u2019s shot put. I make a list of the meets I would like to compete in and hand that to my agent. Our agents have many important jobs but I\u2019d argue reaching out to meet directors is the most important. Our agents are our advocates. They approach meet directors and discuss why their athlete should receive an invite to the meet. Most of the time it’s a quick and easy process. Other times, the meet director may wait until just a couple days before the meet to extend the invite. Needless to say, we athletes have learned to stay ready for anything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once my agent informs me I have been successfully invited to a meet, I will book travel. Typically, I try to set up a meet schedule that allows me to hit a couple meets while I’m overseas with minimal down time between meets. So, it\u2019s a lot of multi-city flights and (once I’m in Europe) checking if it\u2019s cheaper to book a flight, a train or a rental car to get to my next destination. I\u2019m like my own travel agent. Most athletes have their agents handle this part but I\u2019ve found I prefer to do it myself.  When the trip is fully booked, I send the itinerary to my agent who will forward it to the meet organizers. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

They send the travel itinerary for three reasons. <\/strong>First, so the meet knows how much to reimburse me for the travel. If I went over the travel stipend they offered, I don\u2019t get reimbursed for the remaining portion. So it\u2019s good to stay on budget. Second, so they know when and at which airport I will be arriving. That allows them to send a driver to pick me up from the airport. Third, so the meet organizers know how many nights I will need to stay at the meet hotel. This is the hotel where they will house and feed all of the athletes for the duration of their stay. It\u2019s fairly standard that they will offer one or two nights before the meet and one or two nights after the meet. If I want or need to stay longer than that, I book my own accommodations out of pocket. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since all athletes are held to this same standard. We tend to unintentionally show up at the airport at the same time. When I leave baggage claim I scan the airport for someone holding a sign with the name of the meet or a desk set up that has the name of the meet plastered all around it. That is where the arriving athletes, coaches and medical staff congregate. Once everyone is accounted for, they throw us into a car, a sprinter van or a bus depending on how big the group is and shuttle us to the meet hotel. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once at the hotel, we find the meet desk located in the lobby. <\/strong>This is like the central hub for the rest of my stay. If I ever have a question, need something, have to get my bibs, etcetera…this is where I will go. At this desk will also be a huge board with all the information we need. Shuttle times to and from the track, when and where meals will be held, medical sign up sheets, start lists, really just everything pertinent to our stay. So once I arrive at this desk I will check in and receive my room key for the hotel. It\u2019s important at this stage to ask who my roommate is. Unless athletes request someone specific ahead of time, roommates are assigned at random. They keep the genders separate but they\u2019ll mix up events and nationalities. All in all, this system works fine but it can get tricky if your roommate doesn\u2019t speak the same language. Personally, I like to coordinate with a fellow athlete and request my roommate ahead of time. I\u2019ve found it\u2019s just more comforting to stay with friends rather than strangers while I\u2019m getting ready to compete.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Once settled in my room, I make myself at home for a couple days. <\/strong>Eat complimentary meals at the hotel, use the provided shuttles to get to and from the track, shake out, do workout at the stadium if that\u2019s available and generally just chill until the competition. It’s a lot of down time but that\u2019s important to keep the body ready for the big day. Competition day isn\u2019t much different. Breakfast, small shakeout in the hotel gym, shuttle to the track, call room, compete and shuttle back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Back at the hotel is when <\/em>
we can finally breathe again <\/em>
after the work is done. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Since, shot put is usually the first event contested, the throwers get back to the hotel hours before dinner is ready to be served. So, we\u2019ve gotten into the habit of treating ourselves to a little meal instead of waiting. One of my favorite post meet dinners is from last year. After the Diamond League meeting in Monaco, Chase Jackson<\/a>, Sarah Mitton<\/a>, Jaida Ross<\/a> (my roommate for this meet) and myself went to dinner. At this point in the season we were all a little homesick and craving something familiar. So, naturally, we got a round of cheese burgers and they were perfect! We ate, laughed, reflected on the meet and just had an overall great time.<\/p>\n\n\n

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Chase Jackson, Jaida Ross, Sarah Mitton, and Maggie chopping it up in Monaco. Pic courtesy of Maggie.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

It\u2019s moments like this that make us close not only as competitors but as friends. Being on the road constantly can be lonely. But no one knows the grind better than your competitor who’s going through the same thing. At a certain point, it’s hard not to befriend each other and we find ourselves helping each other through the tough times, the boredom of hotel life and homesickness we all eventually go through.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

So now it\u2019s the evening of the competition. <\/strong>It\u2019s not unusual for people to leave for the airport or train station at this time. I usually book my travel for the morning after in case the meet runs long. So bright eyed and bushy tailed at usually around 4am the following morning, I will load back into a shuttle bound for the airport. Am I going home? Am I going straight to my next meet? Am I going to a training camp because there\u2019s too much time before my next meet and they won\u2019t pay for my housing that long? It all depends on the schedule I set up at the top of the season. But the process always stays the same. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The one thing I can guarantee is that I’m not going on vacation. <\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

We travel to compete. It\u2019s a bunch of work trips. It\u2019s not the glamorous travel-and-explore-a-country that you may think it is. We see very little aside from airports, hotels and stadiums. However, it\u2019s an opportunity unlike any other, and I wouldn\u2019t trade it for anything.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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World class putter Maggie Ewen will be filing monthly reports as she travels the world plying her trade. In this piece, Maggie gives McThrows readers insight into life on the road as a professional putter. If you\u2019re a fan of the professional circuit, I’m betting you\u2019ve noticed throwers always seem to be traveling. Sometimes even … Continue reading Life on the circuit with Maggie Ewen: March, 2026 edition.<\/span> →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":9,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4646","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-shot-put"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p8knIb-1cW","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4646","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/9"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4646"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4646\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4743,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4646\/revisions\/4743"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4646"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4646"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mcthrows.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4646"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}