Shelly O’Brien 1994

As Kelly Elmlinger warmed up for the triathlon at Paralympics in Paris, coach and trainer Shelly O’Brien ’94 watched from the sidelines. For six years, Shelly had worked closely with the athlete: teaching her strategies for the grueling race, setting training regimens, and connecting her with whatever equipment and specialists she needed.

With a streak of nine straight triathlon wins in the past year, Kelly was the clear favorite for the competition in early September. Still Shelly was nervous. Anything could happen in the race that moves from swimming to running to cycling. Anything could happen with an athlete missing a leg. Anything could happen at the Olympics.

Shelly herself had been on track to compete at the international games shortly after graduating from Sweet Briar in 1994. She trained intensively with the national team for the pentathlon—an event featuring swimming, running, fencing, shooting, and horseback riding—which was to be added to the 1996 Olympics. She received the gold medal for the event at the U.S. Olympic Festival in 1995.

By then, though, the international committee had decided not to include a women’s pentathlon in the 1996 games after all. All funding for the training dried up. Shelly was crushed. “It was very tough,” she recalls. “I put all my eggs in one basket. I had to start over.”

That involved switching from training for the pentathlon to the triathlon. And it involved finding a job. “I was a broke athlete. I had to make a dollar so I could keep training.”

Raised on a horse farm in Iowa, Shelly came to Sweet Briar intent on studying art and riding horses. But after freshman year, she decided she wanted a major more aligned with her interests and passion, particularly sports medicine. She planned to transfer, until her soccer coach, Jennifer Crispen, associate professor in physical education, approached her.

“We don’t want you to leave the college. What can we do to keep you here?” Jennifer asked her. Sweet Briar helped her design her own sports medicine major, cobbling together courses from nearby colleges and lending her a car to get to classes elsewhere. She shadowed an orthopedic surgeon who had a physical therapy clinic, allowing her to watch the process of moving from surgery through rehabilitation.

Shelly tapped that experience to begin work as a personal trainer. She started working at a commercial gym in San Antonio, Texas, but soon developed a clientele referred by doctors and physical therapists. These ranged from people recovering from injuries to those with Parkinson’s disease, aneurysms, and other ailments affecting their movement. She worked out of various gyms until opening her own studio in 2020.

As she built her business, IconOne Fitness, she remained immersed in competitive athletics. She was the U.S.A. Triathlon Long Course national champion in 2004, and the following year, she finished eighth at the Long Course World Championships in Denmark.

A bicycle crash in 2006 ended her competitive career, and she became involved in developing a pipeline of young triathletes for the Junior Olympics, including directing camps and clinics, as well as some personal coaching. Some of the young people she worked with went on to win medals at the Junior Olympics and eventually the Olympics.

In 2018, she was asked to join U.S.A. Paratriathlon and began working a promising athlete: Kelly Elmlinger, an Army veteran who lost a leg to cancer.

“Given my passion, education, and experience in biomechanics, I felt confident I could work with her,” Shelly recalls in a recent blog post. “In short order there was a reality check. My confidence was naive and very presumptive. The learning curve was about to go vertical–for many years.”

They stayed in touch every day, either in person or online. Shelly provided routines for building muscles or working through physical challenges. She found other professionals who could help Kelly with other issues, ranging from pain management to bicycle maintenance.

Kelly qualified for Tokyo Olympics, but given COVID-era restrictions on attendance, Shelly had to watch from home. The 2024 games mark the first time that Shelly has come to an Olympic event—as a competitor or as a coach. She learned just before the games that she had been named Paralympic Coach of the Year.

In late August, Kelly warmed up on the Paris course, familiarizing herself with the route that included a swim in the Seine. But after the warm-up round, Kelly fell ill and went from running along the streets to Paris to being pushed in a wheelchair. As other contestants lined up for the triathlon on Sept. 2, she was at a clinic being treated for her illness.

The results were devastating for athlete and coach. “We were heavily favored to win, and to be totally flattened like that was so hard,” Shelly recalls.

Shelly tapped her own resilience as she helped Kelly manage the disappointment and plan for next steps. “That was probably the hardest week I’ve ever had as a coach,” she says. “No one wants to get to the games and have to pull out.”

Back in San Antonio, Shelly and Kelly plan to take a few months off and then, start training for the next race.