How women came to dominate Team GB's medal mission

The Winter Olympics have never been considered Team GB’s forte, and it’s fair to say there is something of a gulf between levels of attainment in a velodrome and those on a ski slope. That is to be expected – the climate and terrain of Great Britain doesn’t really lend itself to winter sports, and the subsequent interest in participation, and resulting talent pool, is small.

When you look at predicted medal tables, Germany – who finished fifth in the Rio summer games table – lead the way with 39 medals in total, while Team GB sit in 23rd place with two. It’s someway off mid-table obscurity, but considering the incredible achievement of finishing second to the United States in Rio, it’s a big difference.

GB are targeting five medals in PyeongChang which, given the four medals garnered in Sochi 2014, would constitute a success to funding masters, UK Sport. And one interesting aspect of this goal is that women are leading the charge on this occasion.

As a triple world champion in Short Track last year, Elise Christie is predicted to take two medals home from South Korea, after her heartbreak at Sochi; 19-year-old freestyle skier Izzy Atkin is also expected to consolidate on her recent success, and could become the first ever British woman to win a ski Slopestyle World Cup event; Sochi gold-medalist Lizzy Yarnold is tipped for great things once more in the skeleton; and Eve Muirhead's curling rink will harbour ambitions of improving on their bronze medal last time out.

But in a nation where the disparity in sports participation, interest, coverage and sponsorship is still so enormously skewed in men’s favour, how is it that Team GB have amassed such a talented collection of women? And what are the stories behind their rise to the very top of winter sports?

For 2014 bronze medallist Eve Muirhead, curling has always been something of a family affair, with her brothers Glen and Thomas both representing Team GB at PyeongChang, and their father Gordon a former world champion in the sport.

“My dad was a world-class curler and competed at many major events and from a young age my mum dragged me and my brothers along, screaming and shouting, probably throwing toys everywhere,” she jokes. “When you watch someone so close to you playing a sport and doing so well, your instinct is you just want to do it and you want to be better than them, so really from a young age I was hooked on to the sport and loved every minute on the ice.”

Though Muirhead was a generally sporty youngster, and also plays golf to a high standard, there were times when she was less enamoured with it, and her family’s influence has always been important.

“I remember I was swimming three times a week and absolutely loved that and there were some days I didn't want to go after school, but mum explained why we were doing it, and trying to keep us active, keep us out there and I look back and all I can do is thank them for everything they did for us. When I was younger, I remember lying and saying I'd forgotten my PE kit - it wasn't a cool thing to do, I'd go and hide in the library with my friends and sit on my phone.”

Clearly, Muirhead rediscovered her love for sport, and is delighted to see such strength in the women’s team. “It's exciting for women in sport that there are all these medals being produced by ladies. It's fantastic. I think for winter sports especially where, maybe we don't get as much coverage, it's a really good chance to showcase that women are capable of performing at the highest of levels,” she says.

With coverage of sport in the UK so dominated by football and rugby – and men’s sport in general – Muirhead would love to see more variation, and perhaps this is where the Olympics really come into their own. With sport as with so many other industries, it’s a case of “if you can see it, you can be it.” Increased coverage is widely regarded as the key to encourage more girls into sport, an increased talent pool and, ultimately, greater success at elite level. In football, for example, one of the most marketable global sports, the women’s game has a 50-year deficit to make up, but increased interest in the sport is seeing huge strides being made.

“There are not a lot of women in sport on TV, and I'd love there to be more. I think it's great that in the winter sports especially, that women are dominating that, and I'd love to see more coverage, not just once every four years, but I guess as an athlete all I can do to help that is keep playing well and keep producing medals and hopefully that gets the sport out there.”

Short Track speed skater Elise Christie began her sporting career in figure skating. Christie had been good at other sports, she tells Eurosport – a theme that seems to run in winter and summer disciplines alike. “I was a very good runner,” she says. “I won county runs and stuff like that. I was good at 800m, but I didn't really do anything else seriously as such.”

Explaining how she got into figure skating, she says: “It was actually because my best friend from school did it, and she took me along. As soon as I stepped on the ice I could skate and I never found it hard. Some people get on and they walk around, but I actually just skated right away.”

Fortunately Christie’s friend was supportive rather than irritated by her immediate success. Though she says she loved being on the ice, there was something about figure skating that she wasn’t in love with. Coincidentally, there was a short track at the rink she trained at, and she was drawn to the sport for perhaps unexpected reasons. “I thought the boots looked more comfortable than the figure skates,” she says.

As Christie spent gradually more time on the track, she was set to hang up at least one set of boots and concentrate on her education before she got a call to join the national team, and, supported by her mum, she went for it. Though Christie accepts “boisterous” short track might not be seen as the most typically “girly” choice, she says participation was split pretty equally when she took it up, and she has never felt disadvantaged by her sex.

“I think anyone in Short Track in Britain has to work hard to be here and work hard for what they get because we haven't had many winners, so it doesn't really matter if you're male or female in Short Track. You really have to prove yourself and work hard at it. I feel like everything's been quite fair. Team GB just have a strong team in general. I've seen a lot of the boys doing quite well, as well. I don't know why it comes across like the women are doing better, but power to the women,” she adds.

Slopestyle skier Izzy Atkin took up skiing as a child, but was also a talented tennis player, competing in a number of tournaments. She eventually dropped tennis to concentrate on skiing. “I used to ski on the weekends a bit because my parents liked to ski,” she says. “At the mountain I was skiing at, after you get to a certain age, there's the racing programme then the freestyle programme. I always liked being in the air and finding bumps on the trail and jumping off them, so I just figured that's where I would fit in the most.”

Though, like Christie’s move away from figure skating, Atkin was dissuaded from pursuing a racing career for surprising reasons. “The mountain I skied at was really cold in the winter and the racers had to wear those skin-tight suits. I didn't really want to try it because I thought it would be really cold,” she says.

Though Atkin competes for Team GB, she was born in Boston, Massachusetts and resides in Park City, Utah, so she is able to offer an international perspective on women’s sport – though the picture seems to differ little. “In the US, competition in general especially in action sports, they sort of favour the men's side of things, because, obviously, they get more prize money, and if they're showing it on TV it tends to be more guys than girls,” she says.

Despite this, she says she benefits from a “cohesive” team structure in Team GB. “I feel there's a lot of support,” she adds. “There are a lot of girls on the team who are doing really well, so obviously the coaches are working with the women. We all sort of train together so it's more of a cohesive group.”

Like her team-mates, Atkin is encouraged by women’s current success in the sport. “It feels awesome - It's awesome to be part of a team that has so many really good girls so we can really push each other in ski and snowboard on the GB Park and Pipe team.”

One woman who knows about headhunting is skeleton gold medallist Lizzy Yarnold, who was recruited to Team GB as part of the Girls4Gold programme. Like many others, Yarnold was also talented in other sports as a youngster, competing for her region in athletics, and at national championships - though she had never fulfilled her dream to compete internationally.

“My dream [was] to become an Olympian but I didn't find the right sport for me until the skeleton,” she explains. “I'd always skied when I was younger, so I knew that I loved winter sports, but because we have no ice tracks, I had nowhere to go to try out skeleton. I'm just really lucky that I fell into it. I loved all sports - whatever I could get my hands on. It was always my dream to go to the Olympics and emulate the summer Olympians like Goldie Sayers and Denise Lewis and it wasn't until I was 18 when I heard about the talent search Girls4Gold.”

Yarnold originally tried to get into modern pentathlon, but after a range of physical tests, finding she was quick at sprinting, she was earmarked for the skeleton team. “Six months later they threw me down a skeleton track,” she laughs. “Although I was petrified, I loved it and you can improve and I saw that progression - the possibility to get a bit better.”

Like her team-mates, Yarnold is quick to pay tribute to Team GB’s men, who she says aren’t far behind, with a shot at a medal for curling, James Woods a contender in freestyle skiing and the likes of cross-country skier Andrew Musgrave and slalom racer Dave Riding doing well. But she highlights the importance of the platform the Olympic Games gives female athletes.

“The great thing about Olympic sport is it's open equally to men and women - it can be a career for women just as easily for men, we have the same funding so if we get the same results, it's completely equal playing field.

I really do think that [I’m very fortunate] that I have never suffered from work place sexism, as such, and I've been given completely equal opportunities in progression, in coaching, in support from UK Sport and the lottery funding.”

And perhaps this is the crux of the issue. Though as Christie points out, decisions such as dedicating a lifetime to a particular winter sport aren’t made on the basis of how much cash an athlete can get their hands on, a professional career as a Team GB athlete is now an option for a woman. Elsewhere with funding for the England women’s rugby and netball teams being cut, this might not be an option in other sports.

Yarnold remains upbeat about the prospects for women in sport: “I feel very lucky and very fortunate that I can go into schools and tell young children that sport can be a career - there's absolutely nothing stopping you from being a professional sportswoman.”