It was the perfect end to the Cancun Bubble, the bow tie on top of a successful debut event for Chasing Gold: With one final donation, Chasing Gold was able to cover one final hotel room for its athletes.
Bill Kolinske’s flight had been covered long before that final donation came in. In fact, every single one of the seven Chasing Gold athletes who traveled to Cancun – Kolinske, Tri Bourne, Trevor Crabb, Kelley Kolinske, Emily Stockman, Sarah Sponcil, Kelly Claes – had their flights fully covered by Chasing Gold. Several of them were also able to get the costs of their hotel rooms – even Casey Patterson, who did not even travel to Cancun but was still stuck with the $750 hotel bill – covered by the generous donations from individuals and companies.
With an eleventh-hour donation, Chasing Gold was able to pick up the bill for, well, Bill (excuse the intentional pun).
It provides an excellent close to what was, by any measure, an excellent event, both for the athletes and the startup non-profit. On the court, Claes and Sponcil were able to successfully win three consecutive country quota matches – fun and very impressive fact: They have never lost in a country quota as a team – and take a pair of fifth-place finishes. They added to their Olympic points total and, just as important, tacked on enough entry points to pass Kerri Walsh Jennings and Brooke Sweat, putting them directly into the main draw for the final two events of the Olympic qualification period, in Sochi and Ostrava.
Financially, that’s huge, as the FIVB pays for the hotel rooms of main draw athletes. Physically, it’s enormous, as Claes and Sponcil will no longer have the stress of the country quota and the qualifier before alas competing in main draw, where they will need a medal in order to pass Walsh Jennings and Sweat in the Olympic race.
Bourne and Crabb, meanwhile, did much the same. With three straight top-10 finishes, they, too, added to their Olympic points total as well as their entry points. They’re also out of the country quota and qualifier for Sochi and Ostrava and directly into the main draw.
With a successful start – and finish – in Cancun, Chasing Gold and its athletes now turn to Sochi, Russia. It is a wildly expensive trip, with flights averaging $1,500 each at the moment.
As always, we need your help in order to continue relieving the financial burden of our American athletes.
