Kehri Jones can already see herself on top of the medal podium at the Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea.
“I visualize myself being on top of that podium and doing what it takes to be on top of that podium,” said Jones.
The 23 year-old Killeen native is the current world champion in women’s bobsled, along with driver Alana Meyers Taylor. Jones is a former track and field athlete at Baylor University in Waco.
“Baylor is home for me. I went to school there. I was able to run there. The people I know there are family,” she said. It is also where Jones trains in the off-season.
At first, Jones wasn’t sure about bobsled. “I was like, ‘Well, I’m from Texas. Bobsled is a little cold. I don’t really know.’” It wasn’t long before she was hooked. “You have so much adrenaline built up. It was so much fun.”
Jones is what’s called a ‘brakeman’ in the sport. She’s the one who pushes the sled off the start, hangs on for the ride, and then stops it at the end of the run. “You can feel the wind flying past your helmet, and you know that you’re going fast,” she says. Bobsleds routinely hit 80 miles an hour.
Jones says she always had dreams of going to the Summer Olympics in track and field. Now that she’s on the brink of making Team USA for PyeongChang, she says it all makes sense. “I thought track and field was going to be it. God saw fit that that it wouldn’t be track. It ended up just being bobsled.”
