BROWN DETERMINED TO PUSH PAST THE LIMITS OF AGEISM
Canadian bobsledding veteran in mix for Olympic berth as he nears 43rd birthday
Some numbers are important to Lascelles Brown — a stellar push time of 4.96 seconds among them — but his age, not so much.
The veteran brakeman is 42 for another couple of weeks. If he’s part of Canada’s Olympic bobsled team next year, and that seems a good bet, he’ll be 43 in PyeongChang.
Brown has already made an early season statement in the Ice House in Calgary, where bobsled athletes push sleds and their physical limits, and the push record is 4.95 seconds, set by former Canadian Football League running back Jesse Lumsden.
During team testing earlier this month, Brown’s first push of 4.96 seconds topped a field of 16 men. Alex Kopacz registered 4.97 and Lumsden 4.99. Nobody else snuck under 5.00.
“It was impressive to them because everyone thinks that age, you know, kind of stops you from being as explosive as you were when you were younger. Or as fast,” said Brown. “But for me, it doesn’t change anything.”
And why is that?
“I think it’s just training correctly and having good people around you, good coaches,” he said. “And you have to be smart about your body and how you treat your body. One thing about me, I always treat my body right, because if you take care of your body, your body takes care of you.”
He’s an imposing sight at five-foot-11 and 220 pounds. But the body changes over time and he takes longer to recover from extreme exertion now.
“About five years ago I could push like 10 pushes, no problem. Now I can do two hard and the others won’t be as effective.”
It has provoked a change in his workout regimen. In consultation with coaches, he dialed it back a bit last year. But with just five months left before the Olympics, what would be his final five-ring circus, he’s cranking it back up as evidenced by his push time.
“And my biggest motivation right now is to actually prove that age is nothing but a number as long as you believe that you can do it,” Brown said. “That’s what I’m using right now. I do not think that because I’m (almost) 43, guys that are 20 and 25 are better than me. I don’t think that at all.”
When they kid him about his age, he uses that to his advantage.
“You’re always going to get that. But I thrive on those things. I like the motivation. I like people not believing. That gives me the drive to prove them wrong.”
Brown’s competitiveness comes from his mental game as well. And for that, he thanks Ken Karpoff, a former biathlete who competed for Canada at the 1988 Olympics in Calgary. Karpoff is now an Edmonton-based author, speaker and performance coach.
But back in 2005 and 2006, he helped Brown, a native of Jamaica, obtain Canadian citizenship just in time to compete in the Turin Olympics. They have become good friends and Brown calls Karpoff a mentor.
“Ken is my guy. Ken believes in a lot of stuff that I believe in. He knows that age is just a number. He knows that sometimes you have to take a step back to take a step forward.”
Brown has taken steps forward and backward while competing internationally first for Jamaica, Canada and Monaco.
He’s the proud owner of silver and bronze Olympic medals, as well as gold, silver and bronze from the world championships, all in Canadian two- and fourman sleds.
“This age thing is nonsense,” says Karpoff. “It’s not a question of age, it’s a question of whether your desire to compete exceeds by enough the pain, the grotesque irritation of competing. The pain of working with teams. The pain of travelling and no money and all of that. There is no romance in this stuff. There is a lot of work.”
Karpoff believes Brown could physically handle another Olympics in 2022, but the desire to fight the mental battle won’t be there. There can be no doubt about Brown’s fire today, however.
I do not think that because I’m (almost) 43, guys that are 20 and 25 are better than me. I don’t think that at all.