Lolo Jones took another step towards the gold medal she so desires.
The two-time Olympic hurdler had been working with the U.S. Bobsled team in Lake Placid for a few weeks after being invited by coach Todd Hays. On Thursday Jones found out that her hard work paid off, making the cut as one of the 24 athletes to be named to the team.
Jones will have a chance to compete for a spot for the team's World Cup competitions this winter and then later a chance at the 2014 Sochi Games.
According to a report from USA Today,
"Jones was named to the team Thursday morning as a push athlete. The Olympic hurdler finished second in a team selection race with pilot Jazmine Fenlator, of Wayne, N.J., on Saturday."
"This is a breath of fresh air -- cool, very cool, cold air," Jones said to the Associated Press.
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."
Instead, Jones showed her skills at another sport, coming in second place during a team race on Oct. 20.
"I didn't have a lot of time to get to know Lolo through the media," U.S. women's bobsled coach Todd Hays said. "These three weeks, I've gotten to know her as an athlete. And she surprised me every day with how dedicated she is. The one word I keep coming back to is, she's such a competitor. She cannot accept not being good at something. She gets up earlier than everybody else, goes to bed later, constantly trying to get better."
Jones, along with Olympic sprint gold medalist Tianna Madison, made the team as push athletes. According to ESPN, pushers are "the ones tasked with helping get the sled moving down the icy chute, then jumping into the back seat for the bumpy ride to the finish."
"Once they were revved up, things started clicking for both of us," Jones said. "It kind of overwhelmed us quite quickly."
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.
"I just came out here and kind of needed to get away from track for a bit, kind of wanted to get some motivation," Jones said about the bobsled team. "I thought coming out here with the other girls that we could help each other, we could benefit from one another. I could help them with their speed and they could help me with my strength. And just being around them, hearing their goals gave me new goals and refreshed me."
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 recently sent a harsh message to paralyzed former Rutgers player Eric LeGrand that caused a stir on Twitter earlier this month after he made a joke challenging her to a race.
After everything died down, Jones released a statement to Yahoo Sports stating: "I'm truly sorry if I offended anyone by my tweet. When Eric challenged me to a race earlier all I knew was that he was a football player, but certainly had no idea he had become paralyzed from a football injury. I thought I was tweeting in good fun like I always do with the many athletes who challenge me to races."
The other options for the push team include "2010 Olympian Emily Azevedo, world championship medalist Katie Eberling, Lake Placid start-record-holder Aja Evans and former Cal track athlete Cherrelle Garrett."
According to USA Today, "the World Cup season opens in Lake Placid, N.Y., Nov. 8-10."
