Name: Jeremy Bloom
Birthdate: April 2, 1982
Hometown: Loveland, Colorado
Olympic Sport: Free Style Skiing, Moguls
Medals: Jeremy did not medal at these games
Jeremy Bloom, 24, had high hopes at his second Olympic Games in Torino after winning the 2005 World Cup moguls crown. But he finished sixth in the freestyle skiing moguls competition. And now, Jeremy says his skiing days are over. He's switching his focus to football. He played for two years at the University of Colorado before the NCAA declared him ineligible because he accepted skiing endorsements to help him train for the 2006 Games. But now he's trying out for NFL teams because freestyle skiing is not his first love; it's more of a hobby that he's just really good at. He became the youngest freestyle skier to win the overall World Cup moguls title in March 2002 at age 19.
Jeremy grew up in Loveland, Colorado which is two hours from Keystone Resort where his mother was a ski instructor. So his family - including one brother and sister and his parents - would go skiing every weekend all year long starting when Jeremy was three years old. Jeremy says that he did his first gates competition at age five. But he says that he didn't realize the concept of going around the gates and instead just went straight through them and was disqualified. Ever since then Jeremy says he took up freestyle skiing. His interest grew in the sport when he watched France's Edgar Grospiron win freestyle's inaugural Olympic gold medal in the moguls event in 1992. Jeremy switched to moguls when he was 10 years old. At age 11, Jeremy proclaimed that he would compete in the Salt Lake City Olympic Winter Games in 2002. During the 1998 Olympics, he analyzed gold medalist skier Jonny Moseley's runs and how he was scored.
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Jeremy attended Loveland High School where he helped the football and track and field teams to state championships. He was offered a scholarship to play football for the University of Colorado. Jeremy was still skiing competitively and hoped to compete at 2002 Salt Lake Games so he deferred the scholarship for a year. The year he sat out, Colorado won the Big 12 championship. But it motivated Jeremy to compete harder and prove to himself that he had made the right decision in focusing on skiing. Jeremy's gamble didn't entirely pay off as he finished ninth in Salt Lake. Jeremy then joined the Buffaloes for the 2002 season opener. He came off the bench to return a punt 75 yards for a touchdown.
He played for the Buffaloes during his sophomore year. During those first two seasons, Jeremy argued with the NCAA over whether he was allowed to accept sponsorship money for skiing and keep his amateur status as a football player. In March 2004, Bloom began accepting endorsements to help ease the financial burden of his skiing career. Jeremy said if the NCAA didn't want him to play football anymore, it would have to kick him out. After months of court rulings and media coverage, that's exactly what it did. In August 2004 as he was getting ready for his third season with the Buffaloes, the NCAA declared the wide receiver/kick returner permanently ineligible because he'd accepted endorsement money from skiing sponsors. To continue his fight against the NCAA, Jeremy has designed a "Student Athlete's Bill of Rights" that hopes will help change the NCAA's rules on amateurism.
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The Future: NFL Hopes
Jeremy spent the summer of 2005 training for football in California with his former Colorado strength and conditioning coach. And in early December, Jeremy worked on his receiving skills and running patterns in Colorado with former Denver Broncos receiver Ed McCaffrey. But Jeremy's size may be his weakness. He's 5-foot-9 and weights 175 pounds. And he hasn't played competitive football in more than two years.
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Jeremy does have traits that can't be coached including comfort in the spotlight and experience with agents. The Denver Broncos have routinely taken local guys late in the draft. Colorado offensive lineman Matt Lepsis was signed in 1997 as an undrafted free agent. Now Lepis is in his seventh year as a starter for the Broncos. In 2003, Colorado State running back Cecil Sapp also signed as an undrafted free agent, and he's now a regular on Denver's special teams. And in 2004, Colorado State quarterback Bradlee Van Pelt was selected in the seventh and final round of the draft and now he's the backup for Denver.
At the NFL combine on February 26, Jeremy addressed the media and said that he believes a career
in the NFL is a practical goal and that his skiing career is over. "I don't see myself going back
to skiing," Jeremy said. "I've accomplished everything and more than I ever imagined in that sport,
and it's been an incredible six years competing in the World Cup tour. But [football] is a challenge.
This is where the challenge is at, and that's what drives me to work and to succeed. I dreamed big as
a kid, but I never thought in a million years in a span of a week I'd be able to compete in the
Olympics and be at the NFL combine." Jeremy's NFL fate will be partially decided during draft
weekend on April 29-30.
***Information Compiled from Jeremy Bloom.com and
NBC Olympics.com***
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