State: Sledder relives Olympic quest

NAPLES -- After 16 years of waiting, when it finally came time for Olympic medal winner Brian Shimer to speak to his fans, family and friends, he choked up.

"I'd rather get in a bobsled any day," Shimer said as he pulled himself together. "That was easy."

So, on a breezy Friday night at Naples High School that was part pep rally and part "This Is Your Life," the Naples native relied on what he knows best.

He took the crowd of perhaps 2,000 Southwest Floridians on a thrilling ride with him through the final run of his career a week ago tonight in Park City, Utah. In a Southern accent that didn't quite mesh with his Olympic beret, he described the turns, the fear, and best of all, the emotion, as he realized the Swiss sled had failed and he had finally ended his long Olympic quest by winning a bronze medal in the four-man competition.

"I can't put into words the feeling," Shimer said, hesitating again as he began to cry before a hushed football stadium. "The joy. A volcano of emotions erupting inside. We got the bronze. Sixteen years. That burden lifted off my shoulders."

It's a modern-day parable of persistence. The Buffalo Bills winning the Super Bowl. Avis beating Hertz. Charlie Brown finally kicking that football.

"It's really unparallelled," said Jon Myers, who practiced wrestling with Shimer back at Naples High and helped organize last night's celebration. "When you look back at everything he has gone through, it's remarkable."

By now, the numbers are familiar to anyone who has paid even scant attention to the odd tale of the Southwest Florida bobsledder:

Five Olympic games.

Sixteen years of trying, practicing, then trying again.

A tantalizingly close fifth-place finish in Nagano, Japan, four years ago, just 0.02 of a second out of third place.

Two sleds. Too many disappointments.

And, finally, one bronze.

They went all out to celebrate Friday night at Staver Field, where Shimer once played football as an all-conference running back. Publix brought 19 sheetcakes and hundreds of hot dogs. There was free Pepsi and red, white and blue balloons. Even the Boar's Head luncheon meats "Haminator" monster truck was there.

They called Shimer "a role model" (his former wrestling coach); "an example to thousands" (his friend Jon Myers) and "damn handsome" (his mom).

The regional Dodge dealers gave him a new black pickup with the Olympic rings painted on the side above his name. The crowd stood when he spoke.

"This is beyond comprehension right now," said Shimer, a typically shy man who signed every autograph, hugged every old friend and had his picture taken with babies. "That this many people would come out . . ."

He is a bona fide, country-music loving, venison-eating, walk-in-the-Everglades kind of Floridian, and his trip from Naples to Park City may one day become the stuff of legend down here.

Born in Naples, Shimer was 1979's state champion in wrestling's 159-pound class. After high school, he went to Morehead State in Kentucky, where three knee operations sidetracked his football career.

But, at 5-11 and up to 190 pounds, he was still strong, and quick. In 1985, the U.S. Bobsled Association sent out inquiries to college football coaches all over the country, asking them to recommend talented athletes who might make it on the bobsled. At first, Shimer thought it was crazy, but he sent in the application and was selected. Then, he refused to go away.

Geoffrey Bodine knows as much as anyone about the persistence Shimer showed in returning year after year. The NASCAR driver became involved in U.S. bobsledding after watching Shimer and pusher Herschel Walker finish seventh in 1992 and learning that the Americans routinely purchased castoff sleds from European teams.

Investing more than $100,000 of his own money, Bodine secured engineers, chassis designers and NASCAR speed experts to build a better bobsled.

But something always went wrong. Following a 16th place in four-man in 1988, Shimer finished seventh in '92, then 13th in two-man in '94, his first on a Bo-Dyn sled. In 1998, everything was perfect, except the driver, as Shimer was widely blamed for a poor fourth run that knocked him out of the medals in four-man.

That was all forgotten last Saturday in Park City. Shimer was nearly perfect on the final run of his career, picking up speed rather than losing it as he moved down the track.

"He drove the race of his life," Bodine said in a telephone interview from North Carolina earlier this week. "Brian thrived on the pressure."

So, with Olympic hardware around his neck, and a great story of triumph over adversity to boot, Shimer will surely cash in on the bronze, right?

"No. Rightly or wrongly our society places a lot more value on winning," said Bob Williams, president of Burns Sports & Celebrities Inc., a Chicago-area firm that matches corporate clients with celebrity endorsers and speakers. "In the Olympic world, it's all about gold."

If he has a niche, it's in motivational speaking. And if shy Shimer can learn to rally some corporate sales troops with his story, he could pick up as much as $5,000 per speech, said Williams.

"He can make a nice living at it if he works at it," Williams said.

But the true value of an Olympic medal was reflected in the eyes of Stephan Bosch Friday night.

Bosch, a former member of the powerful German bobsled team who competed against Shimer a decade ago but never made an Olympic team, has moved to nearby Cape Coral. He came to the high school to deliver a congratulatory bottle of champagne.

Unwilling to shove his way to the front of the line, Bosch waited just a few feet away as Shimer signed autograph after autograph. Finally, he handed the bottle to someone and asked them to deliver it to Shimer. He walked away. He clearly wasn't jealous, but his eyes betrayed a certain desire.

"Yes, but this was Brian's medal. He was supposed to get it after all he went through," Bosch said. "That is good."

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