Veteran slider Elana Meyers Taylor of the United States celebrates after her run in the women's monobob bobsleigh on Monday.Julian Finney/Getty Images
Canadian bobsledder Melissa Lotholz stood clapping with tears filling her eyes as she watched from an athletes’ area in the finish house, watching fellow competitor, American Elana Meyers Taylor, race to a gold medal.
Lotholz finished sixth in the Olympic women’s monobob event in Cortina on Monday. But she was overjoyed to see the 41-year-old U.S bobsledder win her first gold medal in her fifth Olympic Games.
“Who’s not a fan of Elana Meyers Taylor? She’s an amazing athlete, amazing human, amazing mom,” said Lotholz. “She’s a mentor within our sport, she’s dominated for over a decade, yet she’d never won the Olympics. This is beautiful.”
Meyers Taylor topped the podium, while Germany’s Laura Nolte took silver and reigning Olympic champion Kaillie Humphries Ambruster was bronze, the former Canadian slider who is now on the American team.
“It’s hard in the sense that she was competing for Canada, she now competes for the States. Yeah, me and her competed together for years, up and down story there,” said Lotholz. “I’m at peace with it, and hey, Kaillie lent me half a kilo for my bobsled today.”
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Bobsled is a weighted sport, and Lotholz’s sled was coming in half a kilogram light for the race, and Canada’s team didn’t have handy a weight plate that small. They asked the U.S. team and Humphries Ambruster, now 40 and in her fifth Games, offered one up before going on to win her fifth career Olympic medal.
Lotholz called the three medalists far and away the most experienced in the newest discipline of bobsled, the single-woman event just added to the Olympic program at the 2022 Beijing Games.
“It’s the hardest discipline by far, because of how loose the back end is. You don’t have any weight,” said the 33-year-old three-time Olympian from Barrhead, Alta. “You saw experience pay off today, and I’m happy with my own performance to be top six at the Olympic Games.”
While the men get two-man and four-man events at the Olympics, the women get two-woman and monobob. The single one event is the only one where all competitors’ sleds are identical in size and design, each weighing 163 kilograms. It’s not about who has the best sled in monobob.
Canada's Melissa Lotholz placed sixth in the women's monobob on Monday, but celebrated gold-medalist Elana Meyers Taylor of the United States.Aijaz Rahi/The Associated Press
Toronto’s Cynthia Appiah, 35, finished 13th in the event, attending her third Olympics.
In her third of four runs, Appiah hit the wall in the second corner and her sled ping-ponged around for a while before she wrestled it back under control. She lost time and slipped down the standings.
“Everyone knows that corner two is the one to really tackle,” said Appiah. “And if you don’t do it perfectly ... the race is over.”
She noticed a huge jump in quality of mono-bob driving in the event between the 2022 Games and now. But she still wants the women to have something the men have. She is envious of the camaraderie the men generate with their four-person teams.
“I still do believe that we should have a four-women event too,” said Appiah. “I think the sport naturally will grow when you have more athletes.”
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