Skeleton Athlete John Daly Says Being an Olympian Is More Than Just 'Athleticism'

MARK RALSTON/AFP via Getty John Daly

John Daly's next Olympic chapter will start soon, and he's reflecting on all it took to get there.

The skeleton athlete, who competed in the sport in the 2010 Vancouver Games, 2014 Sochi Games, and 2018 PyeongChang Games, spoke to PEOPLE last year about what makes an Olympian, noting it takes more than just athletic skill.

"What I would hope everyone takes from watching skeleton or any Olympic sport is that, with enough time and effort, you can accomplish almost anything you want, if you just don't give up," explained Daly. "And it's so cliche and so corny, but a lot of the Olympic sports, there's athleticism and involvement, but there's a lot of the Olympic sports that are more just a skill."

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The New York native, who will represent Team USA again at the Beijing Games starting Feb. 4, says that "if there's a skill to be learned, you can learn it, you can achieve it, you could master it."

Daly, 36, said that with skeleton, specifically, "you have to be athletic, but there's a high skill level, and skills can be learned."

"So what I do, I've learned the skills better than everyone else, but it doesn't mean someone else can't be nearly as good," Daly said. "Whereas some things, you're just like, 'Well, I'll never run 9.5 in the hundred-meter.' But being a skeleton, there's someone that could easily accomplish what I have. It's just by focusing and learning it."

In skeleton, the athlete lies face-down and head-first on a flat sled. The sled is raced on an ice track. It made its Olympic debut in 1928, then, save for one year, was off the Winter Games calendar until 2002 in Salt Lake City.

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"I think what we do as Olympians, is we carry kind of everything we learned here and bring it over into the next path of life," Daly reflected.

To learn more about all the Olympic and Paralympic hopefuls, visit TeamUSA.org. Watch the Winter Olympics, beginning Feb 3, and the Paralympics, beginning March 4, on NBC.