Elana Meyers Taylor’s Olympic triumph lifts us all

In a colorful space in a Roswell strip mall, Elana Meyers Taylor is not known as a historically successful Olympic bobsledder when she has visited.

“She doesn’t put on airs,” Jennifer Rackley, operations manager for GiGi’s Playhouse Atlanta, told The Atlanta Journal-Constitution Tuesday. “She’s just Nico’s mom when she’s here, which is why we love her.”

You may know now about Meyers Taylor, the 41-year-old mother from Douglas County who won gold in the monobob at the Winter Olympics Monday in Italy.

And you may have seen Meyers Taylor celebrating with her sons, 5-year-old Nico and 3-year-old Noah, both of whom are deaf. Nico has Down syndrome, which is what has brought him and his mom to GiGi’s Playhouse, a nonprofit that provides free services to individuals with Down syndrome.

Beyond their delight in her gold medal, it was that part — Meyers Taylor unabashedly sharing the spotlight with her sons, scooping up Nico in a hug and signing to both that she had won — that had Rackley and the GiGi’s Playhouse community walking on a cloud Tuesday.

“It’s an incredible awareness piece for everyone — the more we can get out there that individuals with Down syndrome are worthy of being included,” Rackley said. “They are just like everybody else. They just have an extra chromosome.”

Everyone in our largely frost-free state had reason to take pride in Meyers Taylor’s triumph in the icy bobsled chute, as it’s believed she became the first person from the state of Georgia to win Winter Olympic gold.

But beyond that, so many have even more reason to identify with Meyers Taylor.

The Douglas County product — she’s a graduate of Lithia Springs High — became the oldest woman to win an individual gold medal at the Winter Olympics, tied speedskater Bonnie Blair for most Winter Games medals won by a U.S. woman and added to her status as the most decorated Black Winter Olympian.

School is out this week in Douglas County. But Arbor Station Elementary School, where Meyers Taylor attended, has plans for a celebration if she is able to come back for a visit, as she has in the past.

“To see someone, to be like, ‘Wow, if she can do it, I can do it, too,’” said principal Emily Felton, whose school predominantly consists of students of color. “‘Because I see someone that looks like me do it, so I know the sky’s the limit.’”

For people in the Down syndrome community, Meyers Taylor’s willingness to willingly and proudly share Nico on a global stage is uplifting.

“We hear from a lot of families, they walk in somewhere and people turn their heads up or (ask) ‘Why is your child making so much noise?’” GiGi’s Playhouse executive director Howie Rosenberg said. “They hear ‘No’ so much and they’re always battling uphill.”

To be at the watch party Monday was to see someone from their own community doing the opposite — racing downhill and showing the world what a family with Down syndrome can be.

“For a community like ours, when these parents sit here and they watch, it kind of gives them a lift to know that they can do anything, that they can advocate for their own child; life will be OK,” Rosenberg said. “There’s nothing that can’t be accomplished if you put your mind to it.”

Meyers Taylor was being true to herself. She brought Nico to GiGi’s Playhouse most regularly in 2021 and 2022 before her husband Nic got a job with the Sacramento Kings as an assistant strength and conditioning coach. (He is now with the San Antonio Spurs.) They’ve returned occasionally when visiting family in the Atlanta area.

“(Nico) would always come to our music therapy,” Rackley said. “That was his favorite.”