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U.S. Olympian and world champion track star and bobsledder Lolo Jones says the United States Olympic & Paralympic Committee (USOPC) and USA Bobsled “risk[ed] permanent paralysis” after mistreating her serious back injuries, which she competed with.
Jones broke a year-plus-long hiatus on X to share a story from Zielhaus that she “couldn’t talk about,” which explained her injuries, lack of treatment and eventual suspension from the Olympic Training Center.
The piece said Jones broke her back during a “race-off for the USA 1 brakewoman seat” in Lake Placid, New York, “days before the 2025 World Championships.” Jones suffered “brutal lower-back pain, numbness, leg instability, foot drop, loss of bladder control.”
Jones then had a massage scheduled with the Olympic Training Center’s trainer, but the appointment was “canceled” by John Faltus, a “top official at the USOPC medical clinic,” because Jones was “only entitled to one massage per week and had already received one that week,” the piece said.
“I was never even given an X-ray or an MRI. I wasn’t even allowed to use the ice bath to numb the pain. I did not even know my spine was seriously injured. I just knew I was in pain,” Jones said in an X post.
Jones later raced in the World Championships with what was later diagnosed as a herniated disc with a disc bulge and tears in her L3, L4 and L5 vertebrae. She also had spinal fluid leaking out.
But she says she avoided a life-altering mishap, saying the organizations “nearly paralyzed me.”
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“Had my pilot hit a wall. I would be paralyzed today. USOPC and USA bobsled put me at major risk and then penalized me for the injury that they gave me testing bobsled for team USA,” Jones said.
Jones was later banned from the training center, and has since spent $100,000 on medical and training expenses, according to the Zielhaus piece.
According to the outlet, the USOPC “acknowledged that… Jones was wrongly denied medical treatment at the Olympic Training Center.” Neither the USOPC nor USA Bobsled immediately responded to an email from Fox News Digital.
“They stripped my rights, completely destroyed me, and no one was held accountable. Finally, the truth is getting out,” Jones said in another X post.
“I remember limping by the sports med room every day, unable to go inside. Millions in equipment and funds are donated specifically to help Olympic athletes rehabilitate, but John Faltus canceled my appointment and locked me out The worst part? USA Bobsled and the USOPC put me back in a bobsled without ever ordering an MRI or properly evaluating my injury, risking permanent paralysis,” she said in another.
Jones never medaled in the Olympics but won two World Indoor Championships in the 60-meter hurdles and two World Championships in bobsleigh events.
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