DECATUR, Ga. — A local high school track coach who qualified for the Olympics will learn this week whether Team USA plans to take her to the Tokyo Games.
Nicole Greene told 11Alive's Kaitlyn Ross she qualified in the high jump, but since she didn't hit the standard height for the jump, her fate is still up in the air.
Greene cleared a personal record of 6 feet 4 inches in the high jump and finished third in the Olympic trials, which should qualify her. But the standard height for the Olympic trials is 6 feet 5 inches.
She stood on the dais with the stand and the medal, and if the Olympic Committee decides that's not enough, Greene said she's still proud of everything she's achieved.
"I'm at peace with whatever decision they do make to take me or not. But I would love to go and rep my country," said Greene.
The athlete said she's still reeling from finishing 3rd at the Olympic Trials.
"You know how every middle schooler says, I want to be an astronaut or a cowboy or a superstar or an Olympian. That was what I thought of the Olympics. It's in the back of my mind, but you don't think it will actually happen," she said.
She hit a personal record at the Olympic Qualifier to get on the team.
"6'4 has always been in the back of the mind. It's the jump I wanted to make. It will put you on a world stage," she said.
She's come a long way with her coach Nicole Hudson from the University of North Carolina when they were invited to come coach the track team at Southwest Dekalb High School.
"I cannot express enough how they've wrapped their arms around us. We came from a university with all the bells and whistles. And Southwest Dekalb just said, anything we have, you're welcome to it," said Hudson.
Hudson was Greene's high jump coach at UNC and is currently the head coach at Southwest Dekalb High School.
Greene is her assistant coach at the school.
"Southwest Dekalb High School is an official Olympic training center," said Hudson.
What's incredible is that Greene was able to train there and qualify for the Olympics without even having a high jump pit on campus.
On top of her training for the Olympics, Greene was also studying to take the MCAT so she can pursue a career in medicine as a doctor.
"No matter what happens, no matter what the decision tomorrow, doing both and getting the score I wanted on that test and then being able to get top three at trials, I couldn't ask for more," she said.
And if Team USA decides to take Greene to Tokyo, she'll be writing her essays to apply for medical school while she's competing in the Olympics, and that would be a pretty hard essay to beat.
She finds out later this week if she made the final cut to go to Japan.