It is now safe to release the breath you've been holding for the past few months, because there is no longer any reason to worry. Everything is going to be fine—good, even! America is going to wipe the floor with every other country in monobob.
I know you have all been very worried about America's chances to medal in monobob at the upcoming Olympic games in Beijing in February. But please, allow me one moment to educate the sad, poor children who do not know about monobob.
Monobob—also referred to by lifelong fans like me as solo bob, the bob, bobby time, monobobbie, bob baby, monalong, and single bob—is a new Olympic sport debuting in the 2022 Winter Olympics. It is for ladies only. "But Kelsey," you might be saying, "what is the difference between monobob and bobsledding?" Jesus, you're pushy. Just wait one fucking second. We are getting there!
Here's the thing about bobsledding: Bobsledding is for rich kids. Now, one could argue that all of the Winter Olympic sports with their fancy skis and fancy snowboards and fancy shooting guns in the snow are expensive, unlike the humble events of the Summer Olympics like "jumping" and "running." But the bobsled events have a particular relationship with wealth because every team gets to design their own sled. These sleds have scientists. They are aerodynamic. They are very carefully made. The secrets of the fancy sleds, apparently, are very closely guarded so as to maintain an advantage over other countries. This, to me, is stupid. My dear monobobbie would never do this.
The monobob's distinguishing feature as a sport is that everyone uses the same sled. No one can have a fancy sled. You must accept the sled provided and share it. Isn't that nice? It's about the driving! Wow. Athletics. I love it!
The beautiful brilliant star of the women's monobob event is Kaillie Humphries. Here, watch this video of her doing low box step-ups with 362 pounds:
She has to be strong, because the monobob is heavy and she is the only one there. She has to steer, drive, brake, and push the damn monobob, which is THREE HUNDRED AND SIXTY THREE POUNDS.
Humphries is not a debuting Olympian. She's attended the Games twice and medaled thrice. But all of these times she has done so for Team Canada. She is, as you might guess, Canadian. But even as one of the best bobsledders in the world, she didn't have much power.
Before 2018's PyeongChang Olympics (where Humphries won bronze) she made an agreement with her team that Canadian coach Todd Hays was to have no contact with her at all. After the Games, Humphries lacked energy and had terrible headaches. She asked Team Canada for help, and they referred her to team doctors. She later learned she was depressed. “I found myself in a situation where I didn’t feel safe and I didn’t feel comfortable," she told AP News. She feared interacting with Hays and claimed she had suffered verbal abuse, mental abuse, and harassment. And similar claims had been made by U.S. bobsledders against him after he coached Team USA in the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
She moved to Team USA in the hopes of a healthier environment to train. Because she is married to former Team USA bobsledder Travis Armbruster, she was able to begin the process of obtaining U.S. citizenship.
So earlier this month, when her citizenship meeting was smack in the middle of the monobob World Cup, Humphries did both. She simply raced in Austria over the weekend, traveled to Germany to race on Monday, and did two training runs on Tuesday to qualify for the World Cup races. Then she simply drove five hours to Frankfurt on Wednesday morning, flew across the globe, attended her citizenship meeting on Thursday and was sworn in as a U.S. citizen, and then immediately flew back to Europe for the races. Then over the weekend, extremely jet-lagged, she bobbed her way to another first place.
Here, watch her bob:
Wow! Look at how easy she makes it look to push that big ole sled. Look how she zips around. I don't really understand how to drive a bobsled, but she's the best at it! Incredible! Congrats, Kaillie!
Humphries will head to Beijing with another U.S. monobobber who has a chance to medal: Elana Meyers Taylor. Here is Meyers Taylor casually squatting the weight of the monobob (363 pounds):
Whew. What a relief. Now we no longer have to worry about Team USA's monobob chances.
