Lindsey Mayo prepares for training on Aug. 29, 2018 at Scouting Camp: Next Olympic Hopeful in Colorado Springs, Colo.
Lindsey Mayo is not your everyday athlete.
She played soccer at University of Arkansas but is a jack of many trades when it comes to athletics. She is a Recommended Black Belt in Choong-Sil Taekwondo, she participates in weightlifting, CrossFit and more.
“Growing up, I played a lot of different spots: swimming, track, basketball, martial arts for a long time, but soccer was always the one that beat all of them out,” Mayo said.
She’s not your everyday rocket scientist, either.
Mayo majored in chemical engineering and physics but decided to venture away from chemical engineering and pursue her interest in “missiles and defense space technologies.” She now works in engineering analysis.
“We have all the designs and all the ways the rocket is supposed to go together, so, someone can say, ‘What does this look like,’ ‘What if we tried this,’ and I’m the one who is supposed to take all the numbers and say ‘Yeah it’s OK,’ or ‘No, it’s not OK, this is what you need to do,’” Mayo said, explaining her role.
While the profession is rare in most crowds, she is actually one of two women in her field at this season of “Milk Life presents, Scouting Camp: The Next Olympic Hopeful.” Fellow participant Molly Hackett and Mayo identified their similarity when they first met.
“We actually both work on the same rocket, just from different places and on different parts,” Mayo explained.
Even though Mayo describes her job with passion, she still felt like there was something was missing in her day-to-day life. The drive to get more from sport didn’t die down when her soccer career ended.
“I was really restless, I didn’t really enjoy my life without athletics, so I decided I needed to get back into something,” Mayo said. “So, I just started training again, and now here I am.”
She had watched Season 1 of “Next Olympic Hopeful” but had never thought of it as something realistic for herself. The talent-identification program is aimed at finding athletes with a background in any sport whose skills could transfer to various Olympic sports. The sports for Season 2 are bobsled, boxing, canoe/kayak, cycling, rowing, rugby, skeleton and weightlifting. One winner was selected for each sport, and the winners will attend camps with their sport in hopes of making the national team.
The winners will be revealed during a two-part docuseries airing Nov. 24 at 9 p.m. ET on NBCSN and Nov. 25 at 1:30 p.m. ET on NBC.
As someone who describes herself first and foremost as a devoted athlete, the opportunity is a dream.
“Competing at the Olympics is really the pinnacle of athletic achievement,” she said. “I don’t think there is anything more admirable than bettering yourself every day and attaining true excellence as a result, which is exactly what Olympians do.”
Regardless of whether Mayo is selected as a winner, she knows that athletics will always be a part of her life going forward.
“I’m an athlete, with an insatiable appetite for the burn of a great workout, the thrill of a battle won and the satisfaction of beating your best every day.”