Monday through Friday, Coach Freddie Harris lead physical education classes for pre-k through fifth-graders at Annie Webb Blanton Elementary School in Dallas. When he's not leading a class, he's in training.
"I'm a competitive person," Harris said. "It's been a while since I was just able to just compete against somebody and push yourself and see what you got."
Harris had a stent playing in the Canadian Football League. He always dreams of being an Olympian.
"I always wanted to do the Olympics, and as I got older, I was not able to do the track and keep up with Usain Bolt and all those guys," Harris laughed. "So I did research."
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Harris started looking into what skills he could transfer from his football days and found a new sport.
'I said 'bobsled, that looks like fun,'" Harris said smiling. "Looks like a roller coaster on ice! So that's pretty much how it started."
A year ago, Harris started training to push a bobsled. That's a challenge in North Texas, where there isn't a lot of ice.
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"You gotta get creative," Harris said. "Obviously we don't have an ice track to go push."
Harris reached out to bobsled coaches, got noticed, and went to the bobsled combine in April.
"I'll be honest, I was scared. My first time going down (the track), even though it was on wheels (not ice), you're going 70, 75 miles an hour on 20 turns down a one mile track in one minute," Harris said. "Last month was my first time running on the ice!"
Next week, Harris will try out for the U.S. National Bobsled Team; a step closer to his Olympic dream. Though he won't be in the classroom, his young students can still learn a lesson.
"You never know anything until you try it," Harris said. "So I always say, if you wanna try something, just do it!"
