Devon Harris helped inspire "Cool Runnings." Now, he's determined to see Jamaica win Olympic bobsled gold

When Devon Harris, a young lieutenant in the Jamaican Defence Force, was asked to join the island's first bobsled team in 1988, he immediately wrote off the idea.

"I thought it had to be one of the most ridiculous ideas ever conceived by man and I do remember saying nobody can ever get me to go on one of those things," he tells Day 6 host Brent Bambury.

But he changed his mind when his colonel encouraged him to try out for the team, and soon became a member of the first Jamaican bobsled team to ever qualify and compete at the Olympics.

I honestly just remember being scared to death and I remember my going down the round thinking, 'You know what, if I die, I die, but I'm going.'- Devon Harris

While the team overcame incredible odds to get to their first Olympic Games in Calgary in 1988, their Olympic dream ended abruptly when their sled hit the wall in the third heat of the four-man bobsled event.

The story eventually inspired the 1993 sports comedy film Cool Runnings.

But while the story may have ended there for most movie fans, that wasn't the end of Jamaica's bobsled team.

Since 1988, the team has made it to five Olympic games — including Sochi in 2014. 

They haven't won a medal yet. But they're hoping to change that come 2018 — and Harris is doing everything he can to help. 

 A new generation of Jamaican bobsledders are in Whistler this week, training and competing in the North American World Cup. It's a step forward in their journey to qualify for the 2018 Olympic games in Pyeongchang, South Korea.

Since Harris did not win a medal, his goal now is to have a Jamaican win it.

"It would definitely be one of those dreams come true," he says.

Overcoming the odds

Harris had always dreamt of representing Jamaica in sports, specifically as a middle distance runner at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. But that never happened. He saw the Jamaican bobsled team as an opportunity to live out part of that dream.

His introduction into bobsledding was far from smooth. "I honestly just remember being scared to death and I remember my going down the round thinking, 'You know what, if I die, I die, but I'm going,'" he says.

He says the courage to want to go down a bobsled track at that kind of speed and level of risk and danger is crucial.

"There's a thin line between being courageous and stupid. I'm not sure which one I was," he says of his own decision to start bobsledding in the 80s.

"I made the decision in my head that I was not just going to the team tryouts, but I wanted to make the team and compete in the Olympic games," he says.

Now, a new generation of Jamaican athletes are following in his path.

Journey to the podium

Since the Sochi Olympics, Harris has been actively involved in recruiting new members to the team.

He says what he looks for in recruits is speed and explosive power.

Since bobsledding is the kind of sport people take up later in life, many bobsledders come from different sporting backgrounds.

Jamaica, an island many budding sprinters call home, is an ideal place to recruit. 

"We tap into that wealth of sprinting talent that we have to find guys who may be missing a screw and want to go hurtling down an ice [course] at an excess of 90 miles an hour."

Harris is certain that a Jamaican could win an Olympic bobsled medal. He looks to Jamaican-Canadian bobsledder Lascelles Brown, who won two medals for Team Canada at the Turin 2006 and Vancouver 2010, as living proof.

The journey may not be easy. And while living in a country without ice has certainly made things harder for the team, it wasn't their biggest challenge. 

According to Harris, the team's real Achilles heel is a lack of funding — one of the things that has not changed for the team since their first Olympic run in 1988. 

Government funding is meager. For the most part, the team relies on the goodwill of their fans and supporters around the world.

Still, Harris is optimistic that they can create a program that will produce medals for Team Jamaica.

"If you create a gold medal program, and you insert Jamaicans in it, they can produce medals," he says. "That's the vision."