American Samoa’s sole athlete at the Winter Olympics in Beijing, 36-year-old Nathan Crumpton, is vying for one of two open spots on the International Olympic Committee’s athletes’ commission.
Sports Illustrated reports a special jacket that Crumpton has been wearing since he arrived at the games is emblazoned with big lettering on the back declaring his candidacy in the ongoing election for one of two open spots on the IOC’s athletes’ commission.
Strict rules limit how much he is allowed to campaign; no passing out pamphlets, for instance.
But Crumpton, who’s already famous for going shirtless at the opening ceremony, 
isn’t just in it for the resumé boost: In his free time, he’s been conducting a survey of athletes for their take on a potentially game-changing question.
“I’m essentially asking them if they think the IOC should be sharing its revenue with the athletes,” Crumpton says. “One of the emerging themes is, plenty of athletes think, in this day and age, with sports as expensive as they are, with the travel demands as large as they are, that they need more financial security. And it’ll be interesting to see, when the survey is complete, what the end result is because there is a ton of money in the Olympic movement, and in many instances, athletes are getting left out of that part of the equation.”
Crumpton acknowledges that other respondents have, like the IOC itself, cited “tradition” as a reason for maintaining the status quo, whereby revenue is funneled to individual national Olympic committees that then decide how to disperse it in the form of stipends and bonuses.
He also understands that, if elected to the maximum 23-member commission—voting booths are open in all three Olympic villages in Beijing through the closing ceremony—he might have to “tamp down my own opinions so that I can reflect the broader opinions of athletes.”
His views have been shaped by personal experience. A former Team USA slider for eight years who missed qualifying for the 2018 Olympics in South Korea thanks to a herniated disc, Crumpton departed in the wake of a messy early ‘19 arbitration case, filed by then-teammate Greg West against USA Bobsled and Skeleton, that resulted in Crumpton losing not just his hard-earned spots for the final two World Cup races that season.
“The CEO and director of sport [of USABS both] apologized to me,” Crumpton says. “And two days after, they cut my health insurance, they cut my stipend, they cut my access to all my World Cup team benefits.
“I was extraordinarily bitter. I was extraordinarily sad. I was heartbroken. I thought that was how my skeleton career was going to end. If I hadn’t found a team, I would’ve quit sliding.”
Fortunately, thanks to his heritage—his late maternal grandmother is Hawaiian—Crumpton found a home with American Samoa, whose NOC welcomes members of the Polynesian diaspora.
The move gained him more freedom to decide when he races and where, as well as eligibility for the IOC’s Solidarity Fund, which he estimates covered about half of his $40,000 costs for the most recent International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) season. “So I’m funded better than I ever was with my stipend through Team USA,” Crumpton says.
He will make his official debut in men’s skeleton in Beijing Wednesday morning, whizzing headfirst down the track with his helmet hovering inches above the ice.
Good luck Nathan!
