Skeleton star named Team GB Ambassador
To mark 100 days until the Pyeongchang 2018 Olympic Winter Games, former GB Skeleton star Amy Williams has been announced as one of three medal winning Team GB Ambassadors for the showpiece event.
Williams won Team GB’s first individual Winter Olympic gold medal in 30 years when she set a new track record at the Whistler Sliding Centre in Canada in 2010.
That success came after Skeleton silver for Shelley Rudman in Turin in 2006 and bronze for Alex Coomber in Salt Lake City four years earlier and was followed by a second gold for current team member, Lizzy Yarnold, in Sochi in 2014.
Williams, who is a Vice President of the British Bobsleigh & Skeleton Association, will work with Jenny Jones and Robin Cousins to educate, motivate and inspire team members looking to be part of Team GB at PyeongChang 2018.
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Williams was the first British woman to win individual Olympic Winter gold in 58 years.
“I am thrilled to be working with the British Olympic Association as a Team GB Ambassador once again,” said Williams, who was awarded an MBE in 2010 and was the first-ever female Freeman of the City of Bath.
“It was really special to be a part of the team behind the team at Sochi 2014 and I am really looking forward to getting to know all the athletes heading to Pyeongchang.”
Before Williams’ triumph, figure skater Cousins was Team GB’s last individual Olympic winter champion. As well as winning Olympic gold at Lake Placid in 1980, Cousins was European Champion in the same year and is a two-time world silver medallist and a winner of four bronze medals across the World and European Championships.
Both Cousins and Williams were Team GB Ambassadors four years ago as Britain equalled its best ever Winter Olympic haul of four medals at Sochi 2014.
Jenny Jones was one of the stars of those Games as she won Team GB’s first ever snowboarding medal with slopestyle bronze. Jones, who spoke to the majority of the BBSA’s Olympic hopefuls at the Team GB Athlete Summit in Edinburgh in August, also won Winter X Games gold in 2009 and 2010, as well as Winter X Games Europe gold in 2010.