Lizzy Yarnold wins Olympic gold
14th February 2014British Skeleton’s Lizzy Yarnold stormed to victory this eveing at Sochi as she scooped up the gold medal in the women's Skeleton.
A crowd, including Olympians from other sports, gathered around the big screen at the University of Bath's Sports Training Village to cheer her on in her two runs today.
The 25 year old, who is a close friend and tenant of Vancouver Games gold medallist Amy Williams, went in to the final run with a comfortable lead of 0.78 seconds from the American Noelle Pikus-Pace.
It was a lead she didn’t relinquish and despite a strong fight by the other contenders Lizzy put in a great time of 58.09. Although it was not a smooth as she might have liked, it was her second fastest run of the competition.
That put her cumulative time from the four runs at 3:52.89, 0.19 of a second ahead of the silver medallist Pikus-Price and 0.44 ahead of the Russian Elena Nikitina in third place, who collected the bronze.
Lizzy’s gold medal carries on a great tradition for British Skeleton, having appeared on the podium every time the women’s event has featured at the Winter Olympics.
Teammate Shelley Rudman finished in 16th with a total time of 3:56.47, crossing the line in 58.86 on her last run.
British Skeleton has its headquarters at the University of Bath where British athletes hone their starting skills on the unique push-start track.