Force of Will Brought Winter to Jamaica

One of my favorite comedies is the movie 𝘊𝘰𝘰𝘭 𝘙𝘶𝘯𝘯𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 (1993), which I watched in theatre when released. Besides an inspirational story, it speaks to the incalculable value of liberty which is essential to human flourishing.

The story is about the first bobsled team assembled in Jamaica which competed in 1988’s Winter Olympics in Calgary, Canada. Four native Jamaicans and one expat American trainer defied every reality to bring this dream into existence in a country with no semblance of snow nor ice and certainly no talent pool for such a foreign endeavor. A memorable sequence in the movie is when the team solicits funding from banks and businesses, only for the loan officers to crack up when asked to sponsor a bobsled team in Jamaica of all places!

Yet obdurate defiance of such odds is the stuff of which new realities are created. Without spoiling the movie’s worthy ending, it is a fact that the team in 1988 won no medals, yet the victory was just in fielding such a team for a sport virtually unknown in their native country. More so, Jamaica has continued to field bobsled teams, qualifying for the two-person bobsled in the Winter Olympics of 1992, 1994, 1998, 2002, 2014, and 2022, with a female team (also two-person) debuting in 2018. Thus, the pioneer team’s defiance of all odds has seemingly created a following for the sport in a country uniquely unsuited to it.

It is frightful to imagine what could have been the result in a centrally planned economy. Would money ever have been centrally allocated to such an endeavor in a developing country like Jamaica in 1988? Possibly, but maybe not. Maybe unimaginative bureaucrats managing scarce funds would prefer to stick to safer bets, like agriculture and tourism. Such a result would be understandable, but also somewhat tragic in its denial of the indomitable human spirit of venturing into new pursuits. Incalculable is the value of free enterprise capitalism which allows people to take the risks, reaping the rewards if they succeed, but also absorbing the losses if they fail.

And there is a certain pricelessness to the boost in national morale when Jamaicans see that they can do anything to which they put their hearts and minds.