Olympic cycling champion Kelsey Mitchell auditions for Canadian bobsleigh team

Potential is a magic word for Kelsey Mitchell.

The Olympic gold medallist in track cycling heard it at a spring bobsled tryout camp and went all in.

"They said I had potential," Mitchell said Friday in Calgary. "That's my favourite word ever."

Mitchell will travel with the Canadian bobsled team Sunday to a training camp in Whistler, B.C.

Canada's bob and skeleton team opens the World Cup season Nov. 21-23 in Cortina, Italy, at the sliding venue for February's Winter Olympic Games.

Mitchell won cycling gold in the women's sprint in Tokyo in 2021. She didn't own a bike when she was recruited into the sport four years earlier.

A fast learner in track cycling, the 31-year-old from Sherwood Park, Alta., hopes to also be a quick study in bobsled. Mitchell had tried bobsled at age 21.

"I just didn't have the leg power, the explosiveness that I have now," she said after training push starts at the ice house.

"With cycling, we do a lot of training in the gym with our legs and lower body. Coming here, my legs were strong enough. It was more so actually getting a little bit more upper body in and then learning how to properly run because the sprinting technique is so different.

"It's kind of an ongoing joke that I need to not cycle my legs when I run and actually be more like a sprinter and drive them like pistons. It's a steep learning curve."

Mitchell says she intends to eventually return to track cycling with an eye to the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles.

Of the 13 athletes who have represented Canada in both Winter and Summer Olympic Games, five were bobsledders.

"I thought about that a lot honestly. It would be so incredible to have that title and be an Olympian in both winter and summer, but I'm just so happy to love sport