Akwasi Frimpong

Childhood

Frimpong spent his first eight years in a small one-room home in the city of Kumasi, Ghana. His grandmother Minka raised him and nine other grandchildren. Though they all slept on the ground and his grandmother struggled to feed that many mouths, Frimpong remembers those years with fondness. At the age of eight, Frimpong joined his mother Esther Amoako, a gospel singer, in the Netherlands. At that time, he was not a legal immigrant to the Netherlands, but his family worked on obtaining his Dutch residence permit. The process took 13 more years, and a monumental effort by his many supporters. He finally earned his residency permit in 2007, and gained Dutch nationality in 2008. When ready to attend high school, with his illegal status, the only school that gave him a high school education chance was the Johan Cruyff College, a school that offers athletes an opportunity to balance sport with vocational education. During this period, he faced several challenges, which Frimpong describes as: “As an illegal immigrant, I had to face different challenges. I was unhappy. I was scared and I didn’t know what to do. I felt abused, I felt out casted.”^[4] It was only after what Frimpong describes as ‘monumental effort’, that the athlete and his parents were able to acquire a legal residence permit in the Netherlands in 2007 and Dutch nationality in 2008.

Running

Frimpong began sprinting at 15 years old, when a friend showed him a medal he had won in a race. Frimpong wanted one, so, in 2001, he started running under former Olympian Sammy Monsels. After just two years of hard work and intense training, Frimpong won the title of Dutch junior champion in the 200-meter sprint. This was the same achievement that earned him the nickname ‘GoldenSprint’. By 2003, he was earning the nickname GoldenSprint and he aspired to compete at the Olympic Games. To honor Frimpong's work, Monsels gave him his golden track shoes at this time.^[5]

Injury and Athletic Scholarship to Utah Valley University

Immediately after his first national win, Frimpong suffered a severe ankle injury that derailed his pursuit of excellence. This was the time when he was still an undocumented immigrant; therefore, many doctors refused to provide him medical treatment and physiotherapy. However, a physiotherapist named Michael Davidson, who had been following the story of this budding athlete, decided to treat him against a token fee of one euro only. Despite the compassionate and professional care provided by Michael, it took Akwasi three years before he could completely recover from the injury and started running again.

He met some students who had studied in America and heard about running opportunities there. In order to utilize the time when he was unable to participate in athletic competitions, Akwasi applied to several colleges in America. One of the universities he sent his athletic profile to was Utah Valley University. He was offered an athletic scholarship.

Track Successes and 2012 Olympics Attempt

Frimpong started at UVU in 2008 and ran for the college team in 100 meters, 200 m and the 4×100-meter relay. In May 2010, Frimpong helped the relay team break the school record during the 2010 Great West Conference Championships, with a time of 41.05 seconds. In 2011, he helped UVU 4 × 400 m relay team win a gold medal and broke the meet record during the Great West indoor Championships held at the Armory indoor track in New York City. Individually, his times recorded for the university were 6.99 seconds in the 60-meter dash, 10.71 in the 100 m and 21.93 over 200 m.^[6] He graduated from Utah Valley University (UVU) with honors in marketing and a minor in business management in 2013.^[6]

After college, Frimpong recorded 6.85 seconds in the 60-meter dash, 10.45 seconds in the 100 meters, and 21.88 seconds in 200 meters race.^[7]

Frimpong aimed to represent the Netherlands at the 2012 Summer Olympics but was a long way from the Olympic qualifying standards of 10.24 for the 100 m and 20.65 seconds for the 200 m. He was only managing eleven seconds after his injury but improved to 10.45 seconds in 2011.^[8] In 2010, he was ranked 70 among Dutch sprinters but managed third in the yearly rankings in 2011. He competed at the 2011 Universiade but was again over eleven seconds for the 100 m – with a time of 11.04 seconds World University Games conclude in Shenzhen – Wrap report. IAAF. He was not selected for the relay team for the 2011 World Championships in Athletics as he was not among the top six runners that year and had suffered an achilles injury.^[9]

Bobsledding

Akwasi was courted by the coach of the Dutch bobsled Olympic team, Nicola Minichiello,^[10] training for about five days at the push track in Harderwijk, the Netherlands. A push track is a bobsled on wheels that runs down a small hill on rails on dry land.

The Dutch team came up to Park City, Utah during November, the team tried out Frimpong as the brakeman for the four-man World Cup Race in Park City. Pushing off the Dutch "B" team, Frimpong, Ivo de Bruin, Thierry Kruithoff and Bror van der Zijde were ranked 21st out of 26 teams.^[11] In September 2013, Frimpong was invited to the Dutch Pre-Olympic Team trials. After two days push off in Oberhof, Germany he was selected among seven other brakemen. His next performance came at the 2013 World Cup Race in Park City where he was in the two-man bob with de Bruin, but after finishing second the team were disqualified as their sled was made of non-FIBT-permitted materials. After this, de Bruin chose another brakeman, Yannick Greiner.^[12][13] Neither Frimpong nor De Bruin made the Dutch team for the 2014 Winter Olympics.^[14]

Skeleton, and Olympic Qualification

After failing to qualify for de Bruin's bobsled team, Frimpong initially earned money by selling his car and working as a door-to-door salesman for vacuum cleaners near his training base in Utah, however, with the encouragement of his bobsleigh coach and his wife, he changed sports in a bid to qualify for the 2018 Winter Olympics in the sport of skeleton, for his birth country of Ghana. By the end of 2016 he was ranked 95th in the world.^[10]

Frimpong competed in the IBSF World Championships skeleton event in Germany in February 2017, finishing in last place out of the 44 entrants.^[15] He confirmed his qualification for the Olympics on 15 January 2018, only two years after taking up the sport.^[10]

Bobsled and Skeleton Federation Ghana

Bobsled and Skeletal Federation Ghana (BSF-Ghana) is the most recent startup of Akwasi Frimpong.^[18] Founded on July 5, 2016, the federation directs any kind of activity related to the practice of Skeleton and Bobsleigh in Ghana. The mission of BSF-Ghana is to maintain friendly relations among its members and national and international stakeholders. In addition to this, the federation also works to defend the sporting interests of its members and support them in representing their interests to the local and international authorities.

Sponsorships

Frimpong has worked in partnership with Nike, Kalenji, and Eurotech Group. He was also the face of Acai Action, a non-carbonated energy drink produced by Neways.