After taking home a silver medal in the two-man women’s bobsled at the Winter Olympic Games, Elana Meyers Taylor has no plans to slow down.
Meyers Taylor, GW’s first-ever softball recruit, was a five-time program MVP and was inducted to the GW Athletic Hall of Fame earlier this year. A double alumna of GW’s public health and business schools, Meyers Taylor saw her No. 24 jersey retired on Sunday in a ceremony honoring the Olympian between GW softball’s games with the University of Dayton.
She picked up bobsledding just two years before she made the U.S. national team, turning to the sport after softball was stricken from the Olympic program. Now, she is looking to test herself in another sport.
Meyers Taylor has tried her hand at playing rugby with the U.S. National Team, who invited her to China to train, and has her sights set on the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. Though she has only played rugby for four weeks, she said she will try to join the U.S. rugby sevens team that will play in Brazil.
When she visited the Mount Vernon Campus, Meyers Taylor said she will also continue competing in bobsled through the next Winter Olympics cycle.
“I’m committed to [my bobsled career], and when you come that close to a gold medal, you’re going to go another four. So that’s my priority. We’ll see how rugby fits into that and if Rio is a real possibility,” Meyers Taylor said. “If it turns out that I can help team USA, then I’ll be there.”
Athletic director Patrick Nero said he was surprised to hear about Meyers Taylor’s rugby plans.
“But that’s what she wants out of her life, so she goes and gets it,” he said.
Less than three months after her performance on the ice courses in Russia, she married Nic Taylor, a former bobsled athlete. Nic Taylor, who coaches at the World Athletics Center in Arizona, proposed at the medal ceremony of the 2013 World Championships, where she and partner Katie Ebering won the silver medal.
Meyers Taylor said her best friend Rebecca Schumer, also a former GW softball player, attended her wedding.
“To come back from Sochi with a medal and then to be able to celebrate that, that was more amazing than anything else,” Meyers said.
