Lolo Jones wins gold with US bobsled team at the world championships. Can the Olympian compete with team in the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi.
Everyone knows Lolo Jones can handle the track at the summer Olympics, but is the winter games the next big thing on her schedule?
The Olympic track star has made a big leap onto the combined bobsled-skeleton team and helped the United States squad win a gold medal on Sunday at the world championships in Switzerland.
The Olympic 100-meter hurdler served as brakewoman for Elana Meyers in the women's bobsled portion of an event that also added times in two-man bobsled plus men's and women's skeleton. According to ESPN.com, the US defeated Germany by 0.24 seconds even though the Germans won three of four disciplines on the Olympia track.
Jones won her first gold medal by competing in the new sport and added the accomplishment to her two world titles in the indoor 60-meter hurdles, in 2008 and '10. The winning U.S. team also included two-man bobsled pilot Steven Holcomb, who lost his event to a record breaker.
According to ESPN.com, "At 22 years, 270 days, Francesco Friedrich of Germany broke a record set in 1935 by Swiss driver Reto Capadrutt, according to bobsled's world governing body. Holcomb placed fourth."
Meyers and Jones were the third-fastest in women's bobsled, which is impressive considering her change in sports. Track stars can move easily towards the sport due to their special skills and leg strength, which can help with push starts for bobsled races. Hays originally invited the track starts to the competition to "share their Olympics experiences with our athletes and to help boost team morale."
The whole idea for the sport change came when the two-time Olympic hurdler was invited to work with the U.S. Bobsled team in Lake Placid for a few weeks by coach Todd Hays. Jones found out that her hard work paid off, making the cut as one of the 24 athletes to be named to the team.
She later will have a chance to compete in the 2014 Sochi Games. Jones has said she will still compete as a hurdler in the 2016 Rio de Janeiro Olympics and will also participate in the next outdoor track season. She will miss the indoor track competitions to work with the bobsled team.
"The obvious is their athleticism and that's why we invited them here," Hays said. "The other incredible quality about them, which was not known to me until they got here, was how competitive and dedicated they are in their pursuit of athletic excellence. They're just great competitors and have become students of the game, just absolutely driven to succeed in whatever they try."
The World Cup competitions run through February, while the Olympics will start in February of 2014. According to USA Today, "The top athletes compete on the World Cup circuit. The lower-level races are part of the America's Cup, Europa Cup and Intercontinental Cup."
Jones grew up in Des Moines, Iowa, and ran track at LSU, where she won multiple national championships in the 4x100-meters. She has won numerous national titles, including in 2007, 2008 and 2009 in the 60 m hurdles. She is also the American record holder in the 60m hurdles.
Although she is considered a world-class athlete and competitor, she has still yet to achieve success on the grand stage when it comes to hurdling at the Olympics. She finished fourth in the 100-meter hurdles at the London Games and finished 7th in Beijing after clipping a hurdle in her race.
The 30-year-old athlete would not be the first to try a hand at a new Olympic sport. Some names in the past that have competed in the Summer and Winter Olympic games include Clara Hughes, who competed in cycling and speed skating, as well as Eddie Eagan, who was a boxer and bobsledder.
Jones has been criticized in the past for getting massive media attention but not performing at the highest level. She previously said about being a virgin: "(it's) the hardest thing I've ever done in my life-harder than training for the Olympics, harder than graduating from college, has been to stay a virgin before marriage."
Jones is a world-class athlete and the attention she brings to the bobsled competition can only be a positive for the sport and the winter Olympics.
