Erin Jackson shouldn’t even have been in Beijing.

At Olympic trials, she’d come in third in the 500-meter speed skating race after slipping. The US only had two spots.

But knowing that Jackson, a World Cup winner, had the best chance at a medal, teammate Brittany Bowe volunteered to give up her spot, knowing that her own best race would be in the 1,000 meter anyway.

That didn’t end up being necessary — the US got a third spot in the race through happenstance. But it helped lead to the scene on Sunday night in Beijing, when Jackson smiled as she removed her goggles, looking up at her time.

After nearly the entire field of competitors had tried and failed to knock down Miho Takagi’s 37.12 time in the 500 meter speed skating competition, Jackson had finally done so with only one pairing to go. Her 37.04-second mark moved the American into first place.

She watched on as the final two competitors went. Once they crossed the line, she could celebrate gold. She hugged her coach, then fell into a crouch before sitting down, overcome with emotion.

“It’s really cool,” Jackson told NBC afterwards.

It’s the sixth gold medal for the US in Beijing, moving the Americans into a tie for third with the Netherlands. Takagi, from Japan, took silver. Angelina Golikova of the Russian Olympic Committee took bronze.

“Words cannot explain how proud I am of her,” Bowe said, per the AP. “I knew she had the chance to do something really special and she just showed the world why she deserved to be here.”

“She made a really big sacrifice for me,” Jackson said, per the AP. “I’ll be grateful to her forever.”

Takagi laid down a marker early on in the competition with a 37.12. Though she wasn’t expected to contend for gold coming in, skater after skater couldn’t get close to Takagi’s time. Until Jackson, who got the start she needed and finished strong, beating out Takagi by less than a tenth of a second.

“I wouldn’t say it was easy,” Jackson said on NBC. “But I was very excited, very happy to be there and really confident.”

Bowe ended up finishing in 16th, with Jackson cheering her on. Kimi Goetz, the third American in the event, finished in 18th.

Suffice to say, Bowe’s unselfish call ended up being the right decision. It helped result in Jackson standing on the podium as the Star Spangled Banner played.

“Even prior to the season, just being there as an awesome teammate, awesome friend, awesome mentor,” Jackson said, when asked about Bowe. “And then of course earlier this year, she helped me get on the team period.”

Jackson, a native of Ocala, Fla., now becomes the first American to win the 500 meters since Bonnie Blair in 1994, and the first American to medal since 2002. It’s been a unique and winding journey to this point.

Jackson started as an inline skater, switching to ice five years ago. With only four months of experience in the sport, she qualified for the Pyeongchang Olympics, finishing 24th of 31 in the 500 in South Korea. Back issues hampered her 2019 season, then Jackson missed all of 2020-21 due to COVID-19 quarantines and an eye injury.

This gold may not have looked likely at times. But that’s a theme of Jackson’s career.

She already became the first black American woman to win a World Cup race, doing so in Poland last year. Now she’s added Olympic gold to her list of accolades, and is the first black American to win gold on that stage as well.

“Hopefully it’s just a stepping stone,” Jackson said. “I’d love to see more people come after me. It would be awesome if I wasn’t the first, but I’ll do my best to set a good example.”