Free Web Hosting Provider - Web Hosting - E-commerce - High Speed Internet - Free Web Page
Search the Web

Image: J. Rodriguez
Jennifer Rodriguez got interested in speedskating because of her success in-line skating.
Rodriguez leaves Florida for Olympic dream
Speedskater is believed
to be first Hispanic-American
in Winter Games
ASSOCIATED PRESS
    WEST ALLIS, Wis. — Having finished her work for the day, Jennifer Rodriguez wanted to slip into something more comfortable. So she grabbed a sweatshirt adorned with the logo of her favorite baseball team.  
       THIS IS A speedskating oval, so it must be the Milwaukee Brewers? No? Well, how about the Minnesota Twins? Wrong again.
       It’s the Florida Marlins.
       Rodriguez, a native of Miami, may seem like a fish out of water who wound up on top of a frozen pond. But this former in-line star will be competing for the American long-track speedskating team at the Nagano Olympics next month - just two years after taking up the sport.
       “I like to come into a situation where no one knows me and I just freak everyone out,” she said with a grin.
       The 21-year-old Rodriguez competed on wheels for 16 years, which seems logical for a native of balmy southern Florida.
       She was a five-time member of the world team for artistic roller skating, earning a silver medal in figures at the 1995 Pan American Games, and twice competed on the world team for in-line speed skating. During her career, she medaled 12 times at world championship events and won 10 U.S. Olympic Festival medals.
       “She’s one of the most talented people I’ve ever seen,” said KC Boutiette, her boyfriend and a fellow member of the U.S. Olympic team. “She was winning on artistic roller skates, then in-lines came out and she picked that right up. She was winning, winning, winning. But then she lost interest in it.”
       By that time, Rodriguez had developed a relationship with Boutiette, who switched from in-line to ice before the 1994 Olympics and wound up making the U.S. team. He encouraged her to follow the same path.
       “I needed something to get me going again,” Rodriguez said. “Ice is a whole new sport, a whole new shot.”
       
SLOW START
       All of the success on wheels didn’t seem to matter when Rodriguez slipped on a pair of speedskates for the first time at the Pettit National Ice Center.
       “The first two weeks I was here, I was just holding on for dear life,” she said. “I was slipping all over the place. I was going home crying every day, saying, ‘KC, I hate this.’ It was awful.”
       Rodriguez didn’t receive much sympathy from her boyfriend.
       “She’s talented, she’s got balance, she learns things quick, but sometimes you’ve got to push her,” Boutiette said. “I pushed her. I didn’t let up on her. I made sure she gave it 100 percent. She was bawling and I was telling her, ‘Oh, shut up. Just go home. Why are you here anyway?”’
       After two weeks of slipping and sliding, Rodriguez suddenly got a grip on things. Since then, her progress has been remarkable.
       
FIRST OF A KIND
       She finished fourth at the 1997 U.S. Allaround Championships and qualified to compete on the World Cup circuit in her first season. At the Olympic trials this year, she surprised even herself by qualifying for a chance to skate in four of the five long-track events at Nagano.
       “To be skating as good as I am right now, my times, I am really satisfied,” she said. “I hope I can go a little bit faster by the time I get to the Olympics.”
       Already, she is a landmark member of the U.S. team. Not only is Rodriguez the first Winter Olympian from Miami, she also is believed to be the first Hispanic-American to qualify for the Winter Games.
       “It’s going to be such a great experience,” she said. “I’ll probably learn so much skating in front of a huge crowd like that in a pressure situation, skating against all the top girls when they’re at their best. I’ll probably learn a lot about my skating and about myself.”
       Rodriguez knows she doesn’t have a realistic chance to earn a medal in Japan. That’s OK.
       “I’ll be shooting for medals in 2002,” Rodriguez said. “Right now, I just want to get the whole experience of the Olympic Games, just like KC had in ‘94. He got that experience and now he’s going for medals. I hope it will be the same for me.”
       
       © 1998 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.
Click to go back to the INDEX