Snowsport GB
Olympic Update 11
Friday 24th February
06.
Sestriere Colle.
Chemmy Alcott dug deep and rescued a
respectable 22nd place finish in
today's Women's Giant Slalom which was won
by her chum and summer training
partner Julia Mancuso.
In difficult
conditions, heavy falling snow and poor visibility Chemmy,
staring 36th,
finished below expectations in 32nd after the first run, 3.58
seconds off the
pace.
Hitting a gate heavily with her head early in the first run unsettled
her
and she struggled to find the rhythm of the course.
On the second
heat, racing 32nd down the course, she had to wait until
Mancuso's victory
celebrations had subsided before she composed an
attacking second run,
setting up well for the difficult fall away turns to
set the 15th fastest
second run time, a an aggregate of 5.23 seconds off
the pace for the courses
which had the starts lowered due to the poor
weather.
"I didn't have a
good day to start and was bit unsettled. I took two
training runs and crashed
on both of them, hitting my head quite badly. I
felt quite dazed and shaken
and that really dents your confidence and just
never really got into the
course. I hit a gate quite hard and that phases
you and you struggle to get
back on it." Recalled Chemmy,
"I've never been in that position, waiting
for the excitement to die down
and knowing Jules had won, so it was pretty
exciting and I just knew I had
to put a good second run down and relax into
it, but 22nd is good enough
after the first run."
" I feel like these
Games have been a bit of a roller coaster with the
emotional ups and feeling
like I let myself down at times. It's tough
because when I look at some of
the splits and I am third on the difficult,
technical sections I feel like I
should have done better, but I am just
going to have to work more. And it's
hard now because you just want to go
away from here and go and race and make
results with what you've learnt
from here, but there are not that many races
left. For sure it has been a
real inspiration and part of the learning.
Seeing Jules win today and
rooming with Shelley Rudman has been a real
inspiration."
Ends