Perthshire Advertiser

Play Better Golf

With Niall McGill

- MATTHEW GALLAGHER

Charlie Guest fulfilled a lifelong dream when she navigated down the slopes at the 2018 Winter Olympics.

But the Perthshire ski star feels her performanc­e level has now hit another level as she targets a return to the sporting spectacle.

All eyes are on Beijing next year and Guest has continued to put in the hard work in order to give herself the best chance of selection.

The 27-year-old from St Martins said: “I have made the minimum results that I need to qualify, so the plan is just to keep improving on those and put myself in the strongest possible position for Team GB selection come January.

“2018 was a definite mixed bag. Obviously representi­ng Team GB in Pyeongchan­g has been a major highlight of my career.

“But I was in such a dark place in terms of where I was physically and mentally due to the constant injury cycle I had been in. I am looking forward to heading to Beijing as a much more experience­d and in-form athlete.

“My performanc­e has just continued to get better since Pyeongchan­g and I would say that I am a completely different skier now.

“I’ve got a team in place that believe in me and the path we are on. We have worked so hard through COVID to make sure we are getting the results that we are. That’s something that has been totally new since 2018 and we have an exciting year ahead.”

Guest, a former Strathalla­n student, has been able to compete amid the coronaviru­s pandemic as an elite athlete and last week performed well at the World Ski Championsh­ips in Cortina, Italy.

Her first outing of the season had arrived in Levi, Finland, back in November.

“I cannot believe that it has already almost been a year since we first went into lockdown,” Guest said.

“It has certainly been challengin­g with all of the travel restrictio­ns and not being able to get any real hands-on physio help, which is something that I really struggled with over the summer.

“But going into Levi was great, it was such a relief to finally get back to doing what we train for and getting a little feel of something that resembled

 ??  ??
 ??  ??

Newspapers in English

Newspapers from United Kingdom