Word: bakken
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Dates: during 2000-2009
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...Focus on just one moment. It is dusk when, at the top of the bobseld run, Jill Bakken and her push partner Vonetta Flowers, a 24-year-old from Birmingham who had once wanted to be an Olympic track star, toe the line for their final run. Bakken stares toward the first, floodlit turn for a long minute - visualizing, focusing. Then she and Flowers pump their fists, pump up the volume, leap into their sled...
...When the ice chips settle all over town, Bakken and Flowers have upset the mighty Germans and set off a frenzy at Olympic Park, Parra has broken the world record and Kwan has spun and jumped flawlessly. More significantly, Flowers has become the first black athlete to win a gold medal in the Winter Games. She is joined in success on this magical night by Bakken, a former soccer player at Oregon State who was one of many U.S. National Guardsmen in attendance in Salt Lake last week; Parra, a Mexican American who had learned to skate on rollers...
...None of the hoopla surrounding Racine and Johnson, however, should overshadow what was a historic, heroic performance by Bakken and Flowers. They are the best in the world - never again will they be just the "other team...
...Bakken's bake-off also had a third contestant: Gea Johnson, a newcomer to the U.S. bobsled team who was posting incredible start times with Warner. When Johnson won the push-off, Racine decided to act, and, as America's top gun pilot, laid claim to the top gun grunt. She told her partner and best friend, Jen Davidson, that she was out and Johnson was in. (Racine had reassured Davidson that their slowing times would not affect their partnership.) Warner lost the push athlete she wanted, and failed to perform up to speed at trials. Davidson took the matter...
...Bakken and Flowers were able to stay comfortably in the shade even after all teams began training in Salt Lake as, through no fault of her own, Racine continued down the twisty tabloid course. Back home in Michigan, her father David was facing a charge of sexual child abuse, the allegation involving a 13-year-old friend of Jean's younger sister. Then Saturday, Gea Johnson busted a hamstring on a training run. This time, Racine made a strange decision: rather than putting athletic potential above friendship and replace Johnson with a healthy alternate, she would keep...