How ‘Jewish Jet’ Jared Firestone slid his way into the 2026 Winter Olympics

In 2023, Jared Firestone wasn’t sure if he would ever get back on the skeleton track.

A year earlier, he had just missed out on qualifying to represent Israel in the 2022 Beijing Olympics. Then he tore his bicep at the gym and took six months off to heal, and “really didn’t know if I would slide again.”

“And then October 7 happened,” recounted Firestone, 35, in an interview with The Times of Israel in Jerusalem last week. “And obviously I was like, I need to get out there as soon as possible and represent [Israel].”

Firestone said his initial instinct after the bloody October 7, 2023, Hamas-led invasion of Israel was to head there on a volunteer trip.

“And then I think, what’s my unique contribution that only I can do to support Israel and support Jewish people, and give them some sense of pride and hope? That was to do skeleton,” he said.

By October 9, two days after the massacre, Firestone was back in the gym — and by November 13, he was sliding down the frozen track at Lake Placid, New York. Two years later, in October 2025, he stood at the start of the qualifying season for the 2026 Winter Olympics more determined than ever to clinch a spot in the Games.

That was a goal he pursued with “tons of confidence every day, just starting with the affirmations, a little prayer, wrapping tefillin, but also just knowing that I put in so much more work than ever before,” he said, using the Hebrew word for the phylacteries worn during prayer. “I just knew it was impossible that anybody was outworking me… because it was not just [about] making the Games for myself, but so many hundreds of people contributed their money to my cause, and I just couldn’t let them down. So any second where I could be doing something to improve, I had to be taking it.”

Three months later, after wrapping up his races in mid-January, Firestone — who goes by the nickname “Jewish Jet” online — just managed to pull off a qualification, scoring one of the last skeleton spots in the Milano Cortina Games, which kick off on February 6.

“It took a few days to sink in — it still hasn’t,” he said last week. “I don’t think it will until I get to Cortina.”

Law school to Lake Placid

So how does a nice Jewish boy from Florida end up hurtling himself down an icy track in a bid to represent Israel on the world stage?

Firestone grew up outside sunny Miami in a self-described Zionist home, attending a Jewish elementary school. He competed as a track athlete in high school and during his time at Tulane University, and he “wanted to keep it going.”

“I wanted to run for Israel, be on the track team. It was a dream I had going back even to middle school,” he said.

Then, while in law school at Yeshiva University’s Cardozo School of Law, Firestone suffered a mini-stroke in late 2013. A few months later, while recovering and watching TV, he saw coverage of the skeleton event at the Sochi Olympic Games, which sparked his interest.

“I noticed that if you’re a fast runner, there’s an advantage there,” said Firestone, referring to the sprint portion of skeleton before the athletes dive headfirst onto their sleds. “And it’s not one of the sports that people start as little kids and just become expert at. A lot of athletes start in their 20s. So I said, why not give that a shot?”

His first time out on the ice was in 2015. In 2019, Firestone officially became an Israeli citizen, representing the country in international competitions.

“I always wanted to try to do something different,” he said. “Knowing that there’s not many Israeli Winter Olympians, and seeing that opportunity to be on a stage where, if I’m not there, then nobody will be there… that was why I found it so meaningful to pick up skeleton and do it specifically for Israel.”

Firestone threw himself into competing, and in 2022, he finished just three spots short of qualifying for the Beijing Winter Olympics. But the journey was far from over.

When he’s out on the track, Firestone wears his Israeli identity with pride, although when he’s traveling in Europe, he said, “I’m extra careful,” and will often remove his Team Israel jacket before entering restaurants. “The other athletes [from other countries], the first time, they’re always surprised.”

But Firestone said he hasn’t felt much antisemitism as a proud and vocal Jew and Israeli — though he knows security will be tight for the Israeli delegation at next month’s Olympics.

Selling the dream

The journey to Milano Cortina was not an easy one, said Firestone, as he balanced his day job as a lawyer with spending the winter months training and competing, along with the fundraising needed to fuel an expensive sport like skeleton.

“It’s hard when you’re selling a sport that a lot of people don’t know,” he said, noting that he has essentially sustained himself through a combination of self-funding and private sponsorships. “You’re really just selling yourself and the dream, and your mission and purpose, and making people want to be a part of that.”

Nevertheless, he rededicated himself to the dream in earnest post-October 7, hiring a personal coach two years ago and, with the start of the season in October 2025, “had to hunker down and [put] complete focus on this because that’s what it needed. The margins are so small, and one distraction — it’s a dangerous sport, too — and you’re heading in the wrong direction.”

Now, in less than two weeks, Firestone will hit the Olympic skeleton track with a Star of David on his helmet and the Israeli flag on his race suit. And those upcoming races, on his sport’s biggest world stage, will be his last.

“This will be my final slide,” he said, capping almost 20 years of pursuing sports professionally. “I’m excited for civilian life.”