LAKE PLACID, N.Y. (AP) — The site of the 1980 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid offers the public the rare chance to try skeleton sledding.
For $75, visitors on winter Saturdays can take a sled ride belly down, head first on a sled the size of a throw rug. While racers take running jumps onto their sleds and can exceed 80 mph, visitors are pushed off about halfway down the run and can hit 30 to 40 mph.
Still, the 40 seconds zip by on the little sled.
Skeleton reportedly got its name from the "bony" appearance of early sleds from the late 19th century. Often eclipsed by bobsled and luge, skeleton returned to the Olympics in 2002 after a 54-year hiatus.
