Team GB - 2006 Winter Olympics

You can follow the progress of the Team GB snowboarders in various places, but a good place to start would be the SCUK Winter Olympic microsite especially if you want to know what's on the telly and when. "Best of British" to all Team GB and especially Lesley, Kate, Dan and Zoe. Just keep off the Vicks Sinex.

The opening ceremony this Friday kicks off the 20th Winter Olympic Games and I'm still finding it difficult to picture the ancient Greeks in their birthday suits competing in the four man bobsleigh. Each to his or her own I guess.

Team GB are looking good with curlers, figure skaters, skiers and skeletoners? galore. But, hey, this is Snowboard Club UK and we have a full on crew of UK snowboarders representing Great Britain this year. Four! Count 'em! Ladies and gentlemen... I bring you our proud snowboarding Olympians.

Dan Wakeham - Halfpipe

Date of Birth: 12/11/1981
Place of Birth:
Home Town: Plymouth
Begin sport: When about 15 years old on the dry slope in Plymouth
Height: 185 cm
Weight: 85 kg
Coach: Craig Smith
Games Attended: 0

Dan is our first male snowboard Olympian and took 5th at the Leysin World Cup event in January 2006. He won last year's Europa Cup outright. If it comes right for Dan on Sunday, he could surprise people.

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Lesley McKenna - Halfpipe

Date of Birth: 09/08/1974
Place of Birth: Inverness
Home Town: Herten, Aviemore
Begin sport: 1995
International debut year: 1998, Tignes, France
Height: 160 cm
Weight: 57 kg
Coach: Andreas Avik
Games Attended: 2002, Salt Lake City
Sporting Relatives: Alain Baxter and Noel Baster, cousins (alpine skiing).

Lesley has the experience of Salt Lake City four years ago and has been on the World Cup podium before. This year she started the World Cup tour late having taken the time to recover from injury and has placed between 8th and 15th in the four World Cup events entered.

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Zoe Gillings - Snowboard Cross

Date of Birth: 14/06/1985
Place of Birth: Douglas
Home Town: Ronague, Isle of Man
Begin sport: 1996, Courchevel, France
Years practicing sport: 19
International debut year: 2000, Les Menurie, France
Height: 170 cm
Weight: 54 kg
Coach: Craig Smith
Games Attended: 0

Certainly considered a medal chance is Zoe Gillings, our first boardercross Olympian in the event's debut Olympics. She's had 1st places in the World Cup a little over a year ago when she qualified for the Olympics, but since then has achieved generally unremarkable low 20 and 30 placed results. Saving it for the biggy? Who knows.

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Kate Foster - Halfpipe

Date of Birth: 16/08/1985
Place of Birth: Toronto, Canada
Home Town: Cuckfield
International debut year: 2004/2005, Oregon, USA
Height: 180 cm
Weight: 76 kg
Coach: Craig Smith
Games Attended: 0

Kate has been consistent this year and generally placed around 20th place. She did get a good 7th place result at the Leysin World Cup event in January 2006.

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SCUK put some questions to Team GB.

How much preparation goes into qualifying?

Zoe: Lots, you have to train your ass off just to get to the competitions you need the results in.

Dan: The quota for qualification was two top 25 positions and 120 fis points. The top 25s where the easy bit, but the points were reasonably hard!

We spent all summer training and before we knew it the world cup season was in full effect with our 1st world cup of the winter in September. at the start of the winter it is hard to find good halfpipes to train in so a lot of time was wasted driving to resorts to find out that their pipe wasn’t any good. I felt for me the best thing to do to prepare for the Olympics was to get as much competition experience as possible as this is only really my second season of serious competition.

Do you perform supplementary training activity or is all physical preparation dedicated to just riding? And what about a nutritional program?

Zoe: Yeah I do dry land training a lot in the summer and as much as I can through the winter, it’s not that easy when you’re moving around all time though. And I just general eat healthily making sure I have enough protein, carbohydrates, fruit and vegetable you know.

Dan: The skiers have all sorts of fitness programs. When I first started to ride for the British team the federation started to try and get us to follow the same kind of plan, but they soon gave up because there wasn't any one to enforce it, there was Craig (GB Snowboard Team Coach), but if he told us to run we’d ignore it, cause he’s hardly the picture of health himself. Anyhow, we hike the halfpipe for five hours a day sometimes, when you come down from the mountain the last thing you want to do is go for a run! When I am in England I get free membership in Canons gym, so I go there regularly to keep up my general fitness. Snowboarding builds up some muscles but not all, so it is good to work on core fitness to build up the strength in your stomach and back.

Do you see the Olympics as the highest accolade in Snowboarding?

Zoe: For me it is yeah but I don’t think it is for everyone.

Dan: I didn't at first but now that I have been following the world cup circuit it feels a little hard to get off, mostly because of money.

I was thinking about next season and what else I would like to do, filming would be the most fun thing to do but unless you get to film for a big production company (which is only a select few) there is no money in it. An alternative to the FIS series is the TTR events, they are a lot more cool, but they are not taken as seriously in the industry, and all of the best young riders are turning to the FIS as it is the best way to make a career out of snowboarding.

Are there top riders still boycotting the Games?

Zoe: A few are but I think they are just missing out.

Dan: I think a lot of the older guys are, maybe because they don't like to see a change, but like it or not I think competition is the natural progression of any sport. New kids come on to the scene and the only way they can prove them self's is by competing.

Does mental preparation play a large role in the Olympics?

Zoe: Yeah there is so much going on and media everywhere it’s hard to stay focused but you just have to concentrate on what your doing and hope it goes well.

Dan: It is hard to compete in any big comp with out folding under the pressure, but as I have been on the circuit now for a while it has become less intimidating as I have made friends with the other competitors. The vibe in training at the moment is quite mellow but I think when the stands fill up with people I am gonna start getting nervous, I don't think any preparation will stop that!

Are you nervous about this opportunity, and if so, how do you control this?

Zoe: Yes. I am always nervous though and I think it is a good thing because when I am not nervous I don’t do very well.

How does the GB team compare to that of the larger force Nations?

Zoe: We are pretty small. There are some smaller though such as Kazakhstan.

Dan: We have one coach (Craig Smith) and that is it. A lot of the other nations have physios, board preps and a selection of different coaches. Lesley has her own physio. I hurt my hip yesterday so I got to use Lesley's physio, I don't imagine there are many Olympic athletes that can say the first time they ever had physio was at the Olympics.

How do you rate your chances? What would you be pleased with?

Zoe: If I do everything I can, I will be happy but because of the nature of boardercross where I will end up is completely unpredictable. I mean I can be riding really good, faster than anyone and someone falls into me, knocks me over and I am out of the competition.

Dan: I am not expected to come away with a medal, in fact I don't want to win a medal because it wouldn't feel right. I know that I am not the best here, I can’t do back to back 1080s. I am just stoked to make it this far! All I can do is put down the best run I can. I would really like to make the finals, that is my goal!

Would you rather win Olympic gold, or for the rest of your days be granted endless powder every time you chose to snowboard?

Zoe: That’s a good question. I have been thinking about it for about 20 minutes now and I can’t decide. I think right now I would pick a gold medal but the next time I ride powder I will want the endless powder.

Dan: Endless powder!

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Ed Leigh, the BBC’s commentator on all things snowboard at the Winter Olympics 2006, speaks to SCUK about his thoughts on our sport's biggest prize... or is it?

What does the 2006 Olympics mean to snowboarding?

I feel very strongly that 2006 is snowboarding's year, I think we will see snowboarding moving from being one of the alternative or periphery sports of the Winter Olympics to becoming one of the central most high profile sports that showcase what the Olympics stand for.

If you look back at snowboardings Olympic history it starts to make sense, we had a dodgy start in 1998. For those of you who don't remember or don't know, Nagano 98 was snowboardings first year in the Olympics, Terje Haakonsen (the world's best snowboarder at the time) boycotted the event and was publicly quoted as saying "The IOC are gangsters". He had his reasons, a messy battle for sanctioning between the FIS (skiers) and the now defunct ISF (snowboarders) being one of them. Anyway that could all have been swept under the carpet had the slalom Gold Medallist Ross Rebagliatti not tested positive for Marujana. It wasn't the ideal debut for snowboarding, but make no mistake, snowboarding had made an entrance.

In 2002, a new generation of riders were on the scene and because the hosts were America and snowboarding was one of their strongest medal contending sports, they gave it a lot of attention. Catering to a younger audience paid off and snowboarding recorded the highest viewing figures for the Olympics in the States. That alone would have been great, but add in the fact that the competitors have some personality and individual style and they pushed the level of riding at least a year, if not two beyond what was happening in standard pipe contest at the time and you have the very essence of the Olympic spirit.

Now we have 2006, while the triumvirate of Americans on the podium in 2002 was alledgedly down to sabotage of other nations training pipes this year everyone apart from Kratter is on neutral ground. This will settle once and for all the debate of the last two years, who is best? There has been so much speculation unresolved because at so many comps not all the players have been present or the pipe has been bad. But this year there are no excuses, Kass, Kratter, Autti, White, Finch it's on!

In your opinion, do any of the Brits stand a chance of reaching the medals or are we just a token nation?

I had a chat with all the UK crew yesterday, Wakeham is trying to find his feet but is visibly nervous, it must be hard for him because I think it is the first time he's faced any of the big guns in competition. And let's face it, it's a truly daunting prospect Shaun White, Danny Kass, The Finns Markku, Risto and Antti, not to mention Giacomo on home turf. If I'm brutally honest, he is not going to medal, but he is such a good rider and getting this far is a huge achievement in itself, how could anyone be a token nation when you consider his results in his road to the Olympics. I'm not going to write him off from the finals because I think if Dan hits form in the Qualifiers he could make the final 12, but watching practice here you have to have back to back 10's in the trick sack if you are even going to entertain the idea of medalling and Dan doesn't have that.

Where the ladies are concerned things are much more open, Lesley is riding well and looking really confident, I think if she could have had another two months training after recovery from her injury she could be a real contender. Lesley is as focused and comfortable as I have ever seen her and you have to remember that she is used to competing at this level. She choked under the pressure in 2002. This year she has less to prove and returning so quickly and successfully from such a big injury has been her main focus, so being here for her is the real prize. I think that Lesley has the maturity and experience to really surprise people this year, I have a sneaking suspicion that we'll be seeing her in the final. Kate Foster is, like Dan quite overwhelmed by the occasion at the moment, she had a nasty slam yesterday that grazed her nose and knocked her confidence so she's got to dust herself off from that. Kate has real potential to ride in three Olympics so she has to look at this year as experience and relax, but because she is so young that will be very hard to do as she will be feeling the enormous weight of expectation that inevitably surrounds an event like this.

And finally, who do you think will win?

There's still two days of practice but right now I'd have my money on Shaun White. Giacomo, Antti and Kass are doing alright but they've got to turn it on soon if they don't want Shaun's confidence getting too high...

In the ladies, it's going to be between Kelly Clark, Hannah Teter and Gretchen, for three girls on the same team there is very little camaraderie and I think there is a deep seated rivalry between these three that will dominate the women's pipe. That said SLC silver medalist Dorianne Vidal is riding really well and could easily sneak in and steal the prize. Like I said before I think the women's event is wider than the men's, so I'm reluctant to call it.

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Article based on our newsletter of 9th February, by Duncan Worrell. Interviews by Spencer Claridge. Published 9th February, 2006. Team GB interviews added 10th February, 2006.