North American Cup: Calgary #1, #2

Race 1 and Race 2 of the NAC were awesome. I raced 2-man with pilot Justin Olsen in Race 1 where we placed 8th and had the second fastest start times. In Race 2, I raced 2-man with pilot Dakarai Kongela to have the fastest push times and pulled out a 6th place finish which medals on the NAC. I'm so grateful to be at this level this early in the season. It's a pleasure to be able to race with two of our up and coming drivers against great competition and be able to produce good results!

During his time in Calgary, Hakeem was able to travel to the Banff National Park just 2 hours outside of Calgary to visit Lake Louise with some of his teammates.

My favorite experience in Calgary was the living situation. We had sixteen guys in a house that only had 5 beds. It was a little cramped at times, and we had guys sleeping all over the place. I was on the living room couch and there were two other guys on other couches. There were three guys on air mattresses and all the other guys shared beds. Mind you, we are all pretty good sized guys. But through all of that, we had great times in the house. We all cooked team meals, played card games, worked on sleds in the garage, hot tubbed for recovery, and just bonded well together. It felt like we all were young again and back in our college days!

The most exciting thing that I experienced with competing in this sport for the first time was the fact that every day is a race. I am a very competitive person, and so when there is anything that is judged or timed, I try to be the best. Even if its only a game of who can shoot a paper ball in the garbage can first, I have to be the best. So even though every day's runs are considered practice, every day's practice times are recorded. So my job--or the part that I have the most control of--is to get the sled going as fast as possible at the start. Every day I wanted to help push the fastest start times out of everyone. So, just going into everyday knowing that there was going to be a competition just made me excited!

The struggles or downfalls of this sport are that it is very expensive and it is taxing on the body. I have had great support, and lots of people have helped me on my journey this far to be able to slide in the races. However, this isn't possible for everyone. With a lot of people not able tcome on tour, there are not very many brakemen. Therefore, there are hardly any days off from sliding. Going down the track at 80-90mph everyday with no seatbelt and no pads takes a toll on some parts of the body. And sometimes, with the drivers being new to a track, there can be a couple of crashes within a few days. Waking up with aches and bruises can make it difficult to want to get in the sled and slide on some days even though I love the sport. But this comes with being a bobsledder. So we have to deal with the consequences the best way that we can in order for us to continue to go out and learn the tracks and win races.