My Story
Small town kid from Idaho with aspirations as large as the Rocky Mountains. Being a product of a single mom I was witness to the value of hard work and determination growing up. I started playing football when I was ten. Most of my other peers had already begun playing one or more sports at a much younger age but due to our financial situation I didn't get into sanctioned sports until later and my love for the game of football was the obvious choice. Never being the biggest, fastest, or strongest growing up I had to utilized my time in high school to catch up to my peers and be the competitive teammate they deserved. After helping turn a losing high school program around and taking 3rd in state it was time to set my sights on a collegiate career. I accepted an offer to a DIII school in Illinois. This brief chapter in my life last all of 3 weeks before I realized this was not the place I was meant to be. After flying home back to Idaho, nothing to do, and feeling lost; I started working three jobs to pass the time until I could enroll in my local university of Idaho State in the spring semester. Spring came and I continued working but a light got lit inside my soul again when my friend mentioned open walk on tryouts for Idaho States Football Team. I had never heard of these before and was unsure what it was going to be like. I emailed the coach and got the dates and times of when to show up. They informed us it was going to be two 40yd dashes, two short shuttles, bench press reps at 225lbs and a vertical. I was confident in all areas of the testing except the bench press. I knew I could do a solid 3 at that time but that was it but my vertical would be my equalizer for the bench press. After most of the testing had concluded they informed us that they were not going to test the vertical and will be in touch if they chose us or not. Immediately, I thought "well this was a fun short lived dream, on to the next."I did get a call that next day and was informed that I was the only one invited to the spring practice from that tryout. I kept this information close and only told two of my friends as I didn't want to get peoples hopes up for an unknown future that I could end at any moment. After making it through spring ball and not getting cut, I had my first start for the Idaho State Bengals that following fall. I had made it from DIII drop out to a DI starter. After completing my four years of eligibility for Idaho State University, helping turn another losing program around, receiving multiple academic and athletic rewards, a scholarship, and being invited to play in the Daytona FCS Bowl. I could happily hang my hat on that college career. However, the drive to compete athletically was still burning in my soul. I had earned a few tryout with some Canadian Football Teams but nothing stuck. At a loss and facing the reality of starting the average life I came across an online add that said "Dairy Life Presents: Next Olympic Hopeful - Bobsled/Skeleton." I thought what do I have to lose, the next greatest thing to playing sports professionally is competing for Team USA in the Olympics. I sent in the required information from my prod day way ISU. In less than a month I was on my to Park City, UT to learn the sport of Skeleton. After going through a very large and painful learning curve it all started to click for me. Capping off my 3rd year in the sport I rose in rank and qualified for housing at our Olympic Training Center in Lake Placid, NY. After training all summer under the best start coach in the world we are ready to kick off this year 4 with our Push Championships in October and the official start of our season in November.
