Sylvia Hoffman: unlikely Team USA bobsledder readies for Olympic debut

The Philadelphian's journey from college basketball to US Olympic bobsledder could land her on the podium in Beijing

Three years ago, Sylvia Hoffman tried out for NBC's second season of The Next Olympic Hopeful for one last shot at becoming an Olympic athlete. After tryouts, she laid on a foam roller, stretching out, when she heard two other athletes next to her talking: The show last year was so great," they said to each other.

Hoffman perked up. A show? She thought this was just a scouting camp. When she asked the two athletes, they told her, Yeah, they're going to make this into a documentary." Still confused, Hoffman Googled what she had just signed up for. Sure enough, it's a show with one season out already. Wow. OK, cool," she thought to herself. She had been so focused on the word Olympics" that she didn't care about anything else, much less that this was a documentary. Well, good thing I tried my best," she said.