How to support a Central Texas skeleton athlete hoping to make Olympic team

AUSTIN (KXAN) -- The 2026 Winter Olympics will be in Italy next February. Darryl Payne, Jr. hopes to make the roster for the USA Skeleton team.

"It's a winter sport similar to bobsled where we both go down an icy mountain, but instead of jumping into a sled, I jump on top of a sled and go belly down face first," Payne said. "Going about 80-to-85 mph."

Payne currently lives in Temple, Texas. He worked in Austin, but quit his job last year to pursue his Olympic dream full-time. He's an official USA Skeleton athlete and is currently ranked fourth based on the last competition rankings. He said the team takes two, maybe three, athletes to the Olympics.

"I would be the first black man to make the [U.S.] Olympic team," Payne said.

When KXAN asked him what that would mean to him, he said: "It would mean a lot, honestly. It's huge to have representation. Having seen somebody that looks like you and open up a door you didn't know existed."

Payne hosting fundraiser at Maie Day on South Congress this weekend

This Sunday, Payne will cook up crawfish at Maie Day, where his close friend Nico works as a chef.

A $40 ticket includes all-you-can-eat crawfish and a beverage. Ten percent of the day's sales will go to Payne's competition fund.

"No athlete on Team U.S.A. is funded by Team U.S.A.," Payne said. "Every athlete is privately funded."

The crawfish boil runs from 11 a.m. to 3 p.m.

Payne ran track at Baylor, made first Olympic run for 2016 Summer Games

"I tried to make it to run in the Olympics in 2016, but realized those cats were really fast," he said with a laugh. "Something I wasn't ready for."

After that process, a new opportunity opened up - one that involved a dramatic temperature dip.

"So, when I was about to retire and hang up the cleats, I got a call from the U.S. Olympic Committee, and they were doing a scouting camp to find the next Olympic hopefuls for sports they were making a big recruiting effort in," Payne said. Those sports included rugby, bobsled and skeleton. "Because I knew bobsled was after watching 'Cool Runnings,' I wanted to jump in the bobsled."

But that dream didn't land either.

"And after going through whole scouting camp and them telling me I'm doing amazing and killing it, and me seeing that I'm killing it, thinking I'm going to win the funded training spot to make the next Olympic games... At the end of it, they were like 'Darryl, I'm really proud of the effort you put in this week, and we thought you were amazing, but you're too small," he said.

This is where skeleton came in.

"What felt like a defeat turned into a new opportunity," said Payne. "Because they invited to come to the pilot school to train for skeleton. I kind of got hooked, and here I am today."

He said spends half of the year in Texas, and the other six months either training in Lake Placid, New York, or training and competing in Europe. While in Texas, he does workouts similar to track workouts, building strength and speed.