Elana Meyers Taylor was all smiles. She gave it her all on the final run.
There wasn't much she could have done any better in the women's bobsled. She was fast at the start. She kept a good line down the blazing fast track. She mastered curve nine, which has thrown off many competitors in the sliding sports.
Meyers Taylor and her brakeman Lauren Gibbs finished with a combined time of 3:22.52. It put them in first place with only the German team of Mariama Jamanka and Lisa Buckwitz left to complete their fourth and final run. The Germans were just as fast, and combined with their other three runs, were 0.07 seconds faster than Meyers Taylor to win the gold medal.
Meyers Taylor and Gibbs won the silver. Canada's Kaillie Humphries and Phylicia George won the bronze.
"It felt great. This is a really tricky track. We had to really throw it down and we had to go after it, and we did that," Meyers Taylor told 11Alive.
Meyers Taylor will leave PyeongChang with her third career Olympic medal. She won a bronze in Vancouver and silver in Sochi. She was honest leading up to the games about how much she wanted a gold medal to add to her collection. Especially after coming up .10 seconds short in Sochi.
If Meyers Taylor was upset, she hid it-- hid it very well. She was all smiles, and she jumped up into the stands where her parents were watching.
"I gave it everything I had. I'm so proud of us," she said. "It was so amazing to have such a support system here and such a support system back home."
It was Gibbs' first Olympics, and she teared up when describing the emotion of winning her first Olympic medal.
"I didn't have any expectations because I still can't believe I'm here. It's everything I could ever want from an experience, and everything I could ever want from a teammate," Gibbs said. "This is been the most incredible four years of my life. I'm honored to represent team USA."
As the two Americans were making their way across the row of reporters, there were already murmurs about four more years for the bobsled pair.
"Why not? I'd love to do it in two man and four man next time," Meyers Taylor said with her partner nodding.
No reason to think about that now. It's time for celebration and recognizing another remarkable accomplishment in Meyers Taylor's illustrious career.
