Jump to content

John Fennell

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The printable version is no longer supported and may have rendering errors. Please update your browser bookmarks and please use the default browser print function instead.
John Fennell
Personal information
BornMay 28, 1995 (1995-05-28) (age 29)
Evergreen, Colorado, U.S.
Sport
Country United States
SportLuge

John Fennell (born May 28, 1995) is an American-Canadian luger who has competed since 2011.[1]

He competed for Canada in the first-ever Youth Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria, where he finished 7th, and at the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia,[2] finishing 27th.

He is the son of former Canadian Football League player Dave Fennell and mother Lynne Fennell.[3][4] His brother David Fennell Jr. played fullback on the Michigan State football team.[5]

In May 2014, several months after competing at Sochi, Fennell came out as gay.[3]

Fennell competed well at the Sochi Olympics, but since he did not finish in the top 10. As a result, in order to fulfil his funding needs, Fennell launched a fundraising campaign on the sports crowdfunding platform MAKEACHAMP on December 12, 2014.

In 2016, Fennell took advantage of his dual Canadian-U.S. citizenship and competed for a spot on the U.S. National team. However, during the 2018 U.S. Olympic trials, he crashed his sled and did not make the Olympic team.[6]

References

  1. ^ John Fennell at Canada Luge
  2. ^ Calgary's John Fennell makes first Olympic luge team Archived 2013-12-24 at the Wayback Machine. Calgary Sun, December 17, 2013.
  3. ^ a b "Luger John Fennell tells the world he's gay" Archived 2014-05-29 at the Wayback Machine. Regina Leader-Post, May 28, 2014.
  4. ^ "Olympian wants to help tackle homophobia in sport ahead of pride parade | CBC News".
  5. ^ "David Fennell Bio - Michigan State Official Athletic Site". Archived from the original on 2014-05-30. Retrieved 2018-01-18.
  6. ^ "Olympian John Fennell's 2018 hopes just ended in the worst way, and he could use a hug". 14 December 2017.