A fourth place finish for skier Kelly Gallagher and a strong performance was the highlight of Day Four (Tuesday March 16) for ParalympicsGB.
All GB skiers were in action in the Giant Slalom but it was 25-year-old Gallagher who impressed the most. She completed her first run in 1:38.65 to put her eighth in the women’s visually-impaired discipline, then had a fantastic second run which raised her four places in the rankings into fourth, just three seconds off a podium position.
The result is the best finish for a British visually-impaired skier since 1994.
An understandably pleased Gallagher said: “The first run was really slow, I didn’t think I was nervous until I started skiing but it turned out I was really nervous because I didn’t ski to my full potential. So we just tried to go up here and ski fast and have fun and try to pull some time back.
“The second run I skied better, like I normally do in training. I’m really happy Claire and I produced two really good results [in Giant Slalom and Slalom] here.”
The young athlete has only been competing in alpine skiing for a year so is a top prospect for the future. “Next year is the World Championships and then Sochi is definitely close” commented Gallagher.
Gallagher will compete in future without current guide Claire Robb: “I’m going to have to find a new guide because Claire is going to pursue new interests”.
Robb is not sure yet what those interests might be: “I’ve spent the last four seasons on snow so I might go and spend a few months on a beach”, she joked. “I want to travel more, I want to see places that are not just snowy!”
“This has been an unbelievable experience”, added Robb. “We didn’t know until about a month ago we were coming to the Paralympics, and since then our journey has gone so fast and everything we have done we have done well in and we’ve performed the best we can. I’ve had a great time, I’m so glad I decided to be a guide.”
Kelly is a Sports Institute Northern Ireland athlete and is funded through the Athlete Support Programme from Sport Northern Ireland.
