LOLO JONES HAS made the US bobsled team, three weeks after trying the sport for the first time.
Jones is one of six women selected as push athletes for the team, a group that also includes Olympic sprinting gold medalist Tianna Madison.
Jones and Madison were among a small number of track athletes invited to Lake Placid for bobsled’s push championships this month by US coach Todd Hays. He believed veteran Olympians would, if nothing else, help some of the team’s younger competitors and raise morale on the team.
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But Hays also had another idea in mind — recruitment. Bobsled has long sought athletes from the track world, with their strength and explosiveness considered the perfect combination to get a sled going quickly down an icy chute.
So now Madison — who was part of a world-record-setting 4×100-meter relay Olympic win in London — and Jones are in the mix for a shot at competing in the 2014 Sochi Games.
Both bring star power. Jones brings an element of celebrity as well.
Olympic hurdler Lolo Jones competes in the US women’s bobsled push championships this month. (AP Photo/Michael Lynch)
She was the favourite for Olympic gold at Beijing in 2008, then hit the next-to-last hurdle and finished seventh. This summer in London, Jones was widely expected to be a medal contender again, yet finished fourth. She competed amid criticism, even from some of her teammates, that she received more attention and endorsements than her accomplishments on the track warranted.
Madison ran the opening leg of the gold-winning relay in London, one that smashed the record held by East Germany for 27 years.
Track star Lolo Jones selected to US bobsled team
LOLO JONES HAS made the US bobsled team, three weeks after trying the sport for the first time.
Jones is one of six women selected as push athletes for the team, a group that also includes Olympic sprinting gold medalist Tianna Madison.
Jones and Madison were among a small number of track athletes invited to Lake Placid for bobsled’s push championships this month by US coach Todd Hays. He believed veteran Olympians would, if nothing else, help some of the team’s younger competitors and raise morale on the team.
But Hays also had another idea in mind — recruitment. Bobsled has long sought athletes from the track world, with their strength and explosiveness considered the perfect combination to get a sled going quickly down an icy chute.
So now Madison — who was part of a world-record-setting 4×100-meter relay Olympic win in London — and Jones are in the mix for a shot at competing in the 2014 Sochi Games.
Both bring star power. Jones brings an element of celebrity as well.
Olympic hurdler Lolo Jones competes in the US women’s bobsled push championships this month. (AP Photo/Michael Lynch)
She was the favourite for Olympic gold at Beijing in 2008, then hit the next-to-last hurdle and finished seventh. This summer in London, Jones was widely expected to be a medal contender again, yet finished fourth. She competed amid criticism, even from some of her teammates, that she received more attention and endorsements than her accomplishments on the track warranted.
Madison ran the opening leg of the gold-winning relay in London, one that smashed the record held by East Germany for 27 years.
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