Frimpong has chancetomake Olympic history

Temperatures hit 38 degrees Celsius this week in Kumasi, the city in which Akwasi Frimpong began his journey to become one of the unlikeliest of Winter Olympians.

Next week, with the thermometers plunging far below zero in PyeongChang the 31-year-old Frimpong will become Africa’s first male skeleton athlete to compete at the Games.

He says he has Dutch football superstar Johan Cruyff – who died in 2016 – to thank for rescuing him from a troubled life as an illegal immigrant in Holland, and Lizzy Yarnold for proving that nonAlpine nations can succeed in the sport.

“When I went back to Ghana and told them I wanted to represent them at the Winter Olympics they looked at me like I was crazy – but it didn’t take long to convince them,” Frimpong said.

“Look at Lizzy Yarnold – she is a gold medallist and she doesn’t have an ice track. It’s not about where you come from, it’s about how hard you push to get what you want out of life.”

Frimpongwas brought up in a four-foot by five-foot home in Ghana with his grandmother and nine other siblings, kicking a tin for a football with neighbourhood friends.

He was eventually taken to Holland, where his sprinting prowess caught the attention of the Johan Cruyff Institute, which helped him out of his status as an illegal immigrant.

After moving to college in Utah in the United States, injury put paid to Frimpong’s track career and led him to bobsleigh, in which he represented Holland before taking the opportunity to switch to skeleton.

Frimpong added: “I want to show that black people can be a part of winter sports.”