The sport of bobsledding is not often associated with any university’s faculty — especially in the South — but Ryan Green is an exception.
Green, a graduate assistant in the kinesiology department working on his Ph.D., recently traveled to a World Cup event in St. Moritz, Switzerland with the U.S. bobsledding team where he worked as an athletic trainer.
“For me, it was my mini-Olympic Games,” Green said.
He first became interested in working at the Olympics by John Purdy, a former LSU athletic trainer and athletic trainer for the U.S. luge team at the 1994 Winter Olympic Games in Lillehammer.
He applied with the United States Olympic Committee in 1997 and finally got an opportunity two years ago. At that time, he traveled to Lake Placid, NY on a two-week volunteer program. There, Green worked with the women’s ice hockey team.
In October 2003, he was given the opportunity to work with the bob-sledders in St. Moritz.
While in St. Moritz, Green said his duties included stretching the athletes, attending to their injuries and providing nightly therapy.
“We had a lot of sore muscles,” he said.
17 nations and 28 teams were represented at the St. Moritz 4-man bobsledding event.
The two teams from the United States finished second and 15th, according to official results from the bobsledding sanctioning body, FIBT. A German team won the event.
Green said that in addition to working with the bob-sledders, traveling to the Swiss Alps gave him the opportunity to train for his true passion — marathon running.
“I had a chance to explore the town,” Green said.
Green teaches a jogging course at the University and ran his first marathon in 2001.
Three weeks after running the marathon, Green said he was diagnosed with testicular cancer.
Green said that he underwent treatment and is now cancer free. He resumed marathon running in 2002 at the Citizen’s Bank Marathon in Philadelphia.
“As long as my body holds up, I’ll keep running,” he said. “I consider it like a second chance at doing things.”
He said that he has plans to run in the Boston Marathon in the fall, after posting a qualifying time in the Baton Rouge Beach Marathon this past November.
As for athletic training, Green said his goal is to be an athletic trainer at the Olympics.
“There are four basic steps to work the Olympic Games,” Green said.
He said that he has now completed two of those steps — the two-week volunteer program and working at an event recognized by a world sanctioning body.
Before being cleared to work at the Olympics, Green said that he would have to work at a World Championships or a Pan-American Games.
However, he said that there is no guarantee that the USOC will select him to work again. But, after talking to the coaches for the bobsledding team, he said he thought that his chances were good.
Green said that when he took part in the World Cup event, he not only represented his country, but LSU as well.
“If you have a dream and it is to represent your country, take advantage,” he said. “It was incredible, absolutely incredible. I felt like I was in a dreamland.”