SOCHI, Russia (AP) – Des Moines native Lolo Jones is getting a new start, and it’s not without some tears. The U.S. track and field star who failed to win a medal in London is back at her third Olympics – but this time in a bobsled. After a year and a half of training, Jones has won acceptance from teammates who have welcomed her as one of their own.

At a news conference Monday in Sochi, the hurdler told the story about how she became a bobsledder, with words that became hard to decipher as her eyes welled with tears. Jones wrapped up the tale by shouting: “They had my back.”  She said her bobsledding teammates in Lake Placid, New York, “accepted me, they embraced me, they lifted me up and I think it was what I needed.”