Brown mines bobsled silver for Canada

Howard Campbell, Gleaner Writer

ALTHOUGH LASCELLES Brown no longer competes for Jamaica, his story is the stuff of local bobsled legend.

Brown was a member of Canada's team that took the silver medal in the two-man event at the Winter Olympics in Torino, Italy yesterday.

Along with Pierre Lueders, the 31-year-old brakesman from May Pen, Clarendon placed second to Germany, and ahead of bronze medallists Switzerland. But before he represented the land of the Maple Leaf, Brown wore the gold, green and black of his homeland, competing at the last Winter Games in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 2002.

Along with Winston Watt, he was unplaced in the final round of the two-man event four years ago.

NOVICE

Dudley Stokes Jr., president of the Jamaica Bobsled Federation, said Brown was a complete novice when they discovered him at a fair in Buff Bay, Portland in the summer of 1998.

"He was doing handstands...a lively character with a sharp mentality," Stokes told The Gleaner yesterday. He added that when Brown was approached to join the bobsled squad, he was 'surprised and apprehensive'.

Stokes says up until 2004, Brown was still competing for Jamaica, which did not qualify for the Torino Games.

Interestingly, Brown did not get the green light by Canadian immigration officials to compete for his adopted homeland until January 27, two weeks before the Winter Games.

One week earlier, he and Lueders won the two-man event at a meet in Koenigssee, Germany. They were part of the team that won the four-man discipline one day later.