The Trinidad and Tobago bobsled team has qualified for the 2026 Winter Olympics – captained by a ginger-haired athlete from North Yorkshire.
Axel Brown, 33, has been on a 10-year mission to reach the pinnacle of snow sports, echoing the 1993 comedy film Cool Runnings.
After narrowly missing out on a place in Team GB at the PyeongChang 2018 Winter Olympics, he used his dual citizenship to establish a squad in the twin-island Caribbean republic.
Now, Axel and his four teammates, who are all from Trinidad, have clinched a spot in Milano Cortina, Italy, next month.
They secured a high-enough finish at the final qualifying event at Lake Placid in New York state on 11 January.
Now Trinidad and Tobago will be one of 28 sleds from 17 nations to compete against giants of the sport such as Germany, Switzerland and the US.
Axel, who was born and raised in Harrogate, said: “There has been absolutely nothing but positivity from the public, from teammates, from everybody. There’s been not a single negative thing come about from it.
The team also qualified for the 2022 Beijing Winter games. (Photo: Viesturs Lacis Rekords / SWNS)“There’s cultural differences for sure but we live together for four months of the year, and we’re a tight unit now.”
“I think we would be happy with 27th place out of 28,” he added.
Axel welcomes comparisons between his situation and Cool Runnings, which told the story of the Jamaican bobsled team making it to the Winter Olympics.
“I probably hear about Cool Runnings on a daily basis,” he said. “Weirdly, in the sport in Britain, you’re really told not to acknowledge it. But I loved the film, and I am happy to embrace it.
“That movie is everyone’s cultural reference for our sport. It’s the only reason anyone cares about it. We owe a debt of gratitude to that movie.”
Axel has dual passports thanks to his mother Carolyn, who was born in the Caribbean in the 1950s.
At the age of five, her family moved to Barbados, where she lived until 1966, before she emigrated to the UK and started a family.
Axel was naturally sporty and became a national medallist in Taekwondo in his teens and also played American football in the US.
On his return home, he tried out with Team GB following the 2014 Sochi Olympic Games, with PyeongChang 2018 as the goal.
He was placed in the development squad as a brakeman on a four-man bob, but ultimately fell short of making the team.
Far from being downhearted, the setback spurred him on and he switched to learning how to pilot – steer – the sled.
He then set up his own team within the British Bobsleigh program, and competed in the North American Cup in 2019.
I probably hear about Cool Runnings on a daily basis, Axel says (Photo: George Sinclair/SWNS)But with growing hostility from the establishment, Axel decided to create his own bobsled federation from scratch – in the country of his mum’s birth.
He said: “I had a second passport. And I thought, ‘why don’t I just do the same thing again and start a new team?’ I knew I needed different athletes, but I thought I could just go and make a go of it.
“So, I claimed my Trinidad and Tobago citizenship after Covid and started work on it.”
That was the winter of 2020 to 2021, and within six months, the squad he created from scratch qualified for the 2022 Beijing Winter games.
The team finished 28th out of 30 teams, ahead of Brazil and Jamaica.
Axel now manages the team full-time and splits his time between the UK, Caribbean and winter resorts during the competitive season.
He will compete in Italy with De Aundre John, 23, Shakeel John, 24, Xaverri Williams, 29 and Micah Moore, 23.
Trinidad and Tobago’s resources are minuscule compared with the world’s best teams. But Axel is ready to give it a go.
He said: “In Formula 1 terms, we don’t even have a car. The big guns have got sled technology we don’t even know exists.
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“We can only ever play catch up. They’ve also got this great recruitment programme; they’ve got the best push (to launch the sled) and their drivers have been driving since they were kids. We’ve got none of those things.
“We’re hampered at kind of every level. If we had our best ever day sliding and they have their worst day sliding, they’d still be miles ahead of us.
“If we do well though, it would be great to go back to the islands to a hero’s welcome.”
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