San Diego, a city known for its ice sheets and passion for cold weather sports, is the place that one Olympian calls home.
OK, only part of that is true.
Two-time Olympic bobsledder Elana Meyers Taylor was born in Oceanside and is training for the Winter Olympics in PyeongChang, South Korea.
She captured a gold medal at the World Championships in February, likely earning herself a spot on Team USA for her third straight Olympic Games. Meyers Taylor won bronze in Vancouver in 2010 and silver in Sochi in 2014, and is looking to add gold to her trophy case come February 2018.
She’s recognized as one of the sport’s most dominant athletes, and her physical abilities give her a clear advantage over other competitors.
“Number one, it's my speed and my strength,” Meyers Taylor said. “I'm one of the best pushing drivers in the world and that really helps get the sled going as fast as possible.”
The bobsled track at the Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid, like tracks in other parts of the country, has gone dormant with rising temperatures. Meyers Taylor migrated to the Chula Vista Elite Athlete Training Center to perfect her craft under the sun.
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There, she got to know her husband, Nicholas Taylor, a Team USA bobsledder. The couple can now call themselves teammates, too, thanks to recent rule change allowing women to compete in the 4-man sled discipline.
This past winter, The Taylors helped drive their mixed gender sled to better results than some high profile all-male teams.
"It’s been such an amazing experience,” Meyers Taylor said. “I have a lot of disadvantages competing in the 4-man discipline, but he makes sure my disadvantages are minimized. But in a two person, if it was us competing against other couples, especially, we'd crush it."
You can catch Elana Meyers-Taylor and the rest of Team USA when they compete in the PyeongChang Winter Olympics in a short eight and a half months on NBC 7.
