Olympics – Skeleton – British flop present raises questions on gear

By David Kirton

YANQING, China (Reuters) – As Laura Deas obtained prepared to slip down the Yanqing ice observe, the Briton knew that she was carrying the expectations of a nation that had received the ladies’s skeleton title on the final three Winter Olympics.

Add within the little element that she had claimed bronze in Pyeongchang 4 years in the past behind champion Lizzie Arnold, the stress actually was on — particularly since her nation had but to win a medal of any color in Beijing.

However all that stress couldn’t assist her to slip down the observe in a time that may put her in competition for a medal.

On Saturday she completed a lowly nineteenth, virtually 4 seconds behind German gold-medallist Hannah Neise. Her workforce mate Brogan Crowley completed twenty second.

A shellshocked Deas was diminished to tears within the aftermath of her run.

“I believe it was a extremely good run and I’m very proud to be ending on that one. I believe it’s most likely among the best runs I’ve executed down this observe,” a tearful Deas informed Reuters.

“Clearly the pace that I so desperately need shouldn’t be there. There’s nothing I can do about it now, it’s executed. I’ll go away and evaluation what’s occurred and take it from there.”

Ladies’s skeleton has been the one winter sport during which British athletes have frequently been world beaters, profitable not less than one medal at each Video games for the reason that race was launched into the Olympic programme in 2002, with Amy Williams (2010) and Arnold (2014 and 2018) bringing dwelling the gold.

That success led to a major quantity of funding being made into the game, giving British Olympic hopefuls entry to prime quality helmets, aerodynamic skinsuits and skeleton bobsleds.

4 years in the past the workforce’s skinsuits provoked grumbles from rivals who thought the outfits unfairly gave the British contingent a aggressive benefit. However no technological benefit was on show in China.

“Actually, I don’t know. The entire workforce has executed every thing they will of their energy to get me to the beginning block in the perfect form attainable and I don’t have the reply,” stated Deas.

British commentator John Jackson, who received bronze within the four-man bobsleigh in 2014, blamed the gear for the flop present seen in Beijing, the place Matt Weston and Marcus Wyatt additionally completed a lowly fifteenth and sixteenth within the males’s race.

“That is what we now have seen with the British gear, it’s simply completely draining pace all the best way down,” he stated.

Crowley additionally acknowledged one thing was off.

“We’ll go away as a workforce and evaluation every thing that we are able to and attempt to transfer on from it,” she stated.

“That’s all we are able to do as a result of there’s not a lot understanding of what’s happening on the minute.”

(Reporting by David Kirton, modifying by Pritha Sarkar)