Cool running Clyde could really chill out

Former Wallabies winger Clyde Rathbone may look to become a Winter Olympian if he fails to put his injury woes behind him next season.

The South African-born flyer revealed today he’d been approached by 2006 Winter Games competitor Jeremy Rolleston about joining the Australian bobsled team.

Rathbone has endured a dreadful injury run since playing the last of his 26 Tests two years ago but is attempting another Super 14 comeback with the Brumbies next season.

The 27-year-old is contracted until the end of the 2009 season and his future will be decided by how well his troublesome knee recovers from chronic patella tendinitis.

He admitted Rolleston’s left-field call had piqued his interest in switching sports if he failed to hit the heights which saw him become the Wallabies rookie of 2004 when he scored six tries in 11 Tests, including a hat-trick against England.

“You have to find things to challenge yourself when you finish football and that (bobsledding) might be something,” he told reporters in Canberra.

“But hopefully that’s not something I have to think about for a while.”

Rathbone’s potential Olympic tilt mirrors the Hollywood film `Cool Runnings’, starring John Candy, which was loosely based on the Jamaican bobsled team at the 1988 Calgary Olympics.

“It’s one of my favourite movies but I don’t know if I want to put eggs down my underpants though,” Rathbone joked.

“You don’t get many opportunities to go to the Olympics so that piqued my interest.”

Rolleston, who competed at the 2006 Turin Games in Italy where he finished 22nd in the men’s two with Shane McKenzie, is searching Australia for potential sliders.

The 2010 Winter Olympics will be held in Vancouver in February, just nine months after the end of next year’s Super 14, leaving Rathbone little time for a successful conversion.

He is currently in pre-season training with the Brumbies after coming through eight matches with Eastern Suburbs at the end of the Sydney club premiership.

Rathbone reported his knee was holding up well and the rest of his body was in great shape, and was enjoying the massive pre-season workload for the first time.

“A couple of years ago pre-season was a bit of punishment, you get flogged all the time and your body’s tired but now I go out there with a smile on my face,” he said.

Rathbone will compete with Adam Ashley-Cooper, Mark Gerrard, Peter Playford and Francis Fainifo for a starting position out wide under new Brumbies coach Andy Friend.

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