PHOENIX — Two athletes with connections to Arizona are part of USA Bobsled's 12 sliders heading to the Winter Olympics in Beijing next month.
The women's team includes drivers Elana Meyers Taylor and Kaillie Humphries – both are four-time Olympians and have spent time training in the Valley.
The two women are favorites to medal in two events: women’s bobsled and women’s monobob, which is making its Olympic debut.
But what's a monobob?
The Olympics organization says teammates of bobsleigh divide among themselves the roles of pushing, driving and breaking. The monobob athlete, however, has to do it all on her own, in a sled weighing at least 162 kg.
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Elana Meyers Taylor
Meyers Taylor won an Olympic bronze medal as a brakewoman at the 2010 Winter Games and then won two silver medals at the 2014 and 2018 Olympic Winter Games and has trained here in the Valley at Altis.
Meyers Taylor is a two-time women’s bobsled world and overall World Cup champion. Though this will be Meyers Taylors’ fourth Olympics, it will be her first as a mom after giving birth to her son, Nico, in 2020. Her husband, Nic Taylor was named an alternate on the men’s team.
Kaillie Humphries (and the monobob)
Humphries is the most decorated woman in bobsled history with three Olympic medals and 13 world championship medals.
Humphries competed for Canada until 2019 and earned U.S. citizenship in December 2021 in order to compete for Team USA.
She works hard to be the best, training six days a week for hours. But what pushes her is equality within the sport, like the women’s monobob. Although she lives in southern California, she’s spent several summers here in the Valley training at Exos and Altis. She still loves visiting State 48.
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USA Bobsled team
The women's push athletes for the Winter Olympics are Kaysha Love and Sylvia Hoffman. The men's team has drivers Hunter Church and Frank Del Duca. They're joined by push athletes Hakeem Abdul-Saboor, Kris Horn, Jimmy Reed, Carlo Valdes, Charlie Volker and Josh Williamson.
The Olympic bobsled events will be held in a four-heat format over two days, according to Team USA's website. Women’s monobob will be contested first from February 13-14. Two-man bobsled will take place from February 14-15, two-woman from February 18-19, and four-man from February 19-20 to close out the 2022 Olympic Winter Games.
