The Australian Institute of Sport has named the five member squad which will continue to participate in its innovative skeleton program.
The Australian Institute of Sport has named the five member squad which will continue to participate in its innovative skeleton program.
The five will receive continued funding from the AIS in cooperation with the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia as the program works toward qualifying a possible medal winner for the 2006 Torino Winter Olympics.
From an initial group of 73 athletes, chosen by the AIS’s Talent Identification Program, ten were selected for further training after exhaustive physiological and biomechanical testing in the second half of 2004.
Since then the ten-member squad has been training in Australia and competing in North America, achieving impressive results in high-level competition. Based on a set of clearly defined performance criteria the five girls selected to receive continued funding from the program are:
Bindee Goon Chew (Qld) - Aged 29 and a former 100 and 200 metre track sprint specialist;
Melissa Hoar (NSW)- Aged 21 and currently ranked number 1 in Australia for open women’s beach sprint and flags;
Jessica Knox (NSW) - Aged 26 and currently ranked fifth in Australia in the 100 metre track sprint;
Emma Lincoln-Smith (NSW) - Aged 18 and another beach sprint specialist; and,
Michelle Steele (Qld)- Aged 18 and the third squad member with a beach sprinting background.
Project co-ordinator Dr Jason Gulbin said selecting the final five had been a difficult and at sometimes emotional process, given the total commitment of all of the women involved in the program.
He said, however, that the door remained open to some of the girls who had indicated that they might continue in the program with private funding. "We would be delighted if some of those not chosen for continued funding were to prove us wrong," he said.
The five chosen athletes, possibly accompanied by other self-funded athletes, will fly out tomorrow for further training at Lake Placid, New York, prior to an America’s Cup skeleton competition in that venue at the end of January.
Options for further competition will depend on results in Lake Placid but could include events in Germany and at Calgary in Canada.
The five will receive continued funding from the AIS in cooperation with the Olympic Winter Institute of Australia as the program works toward qualifying a possible medal winner for the 2006 Torino Winter Olympics.
From an initial group of 73 athletes, chosen by the AIS’s Talent Identification Program, ten were selected for further training after exhaustive physiological and biomechanical testing in the second half of 2004.
Since then the ten-member squad has been training in Australia and competing in North America, achieving impressive results in high-level competition. Based on a set of clearly defined performance criteria the five girls selected to receive continued funding from the program are:
Bindee Goon Chew (Qld) - Aged 29 and a former 100 and 200 metre track sprint specialist;
Melissa Hoar (NSW)- Aged 21 and currently ranked number 1 in Australia for open women’s beach sprint and flags;
Jessica Knox (NSW) - Aged 26 and currently ranked fifth in Australia in the 100 metre track sprint;
Emma Lincoln-Smith (NSW) - Aged 18 and another beach sprint specialist; and,
Michelle Steele (Qld)- Aged 18 and the third squad member with a beach sprinting background.
Project co-ordinator Dr Jason Gulbin said selecting the final five had been a difficult and at sometimes emotional process, given the total commitment of all of the women involved in the program.
He said, however, that the door remained open to some of the girls who had indicated that they might continue in the program with private funding. "We would be delighted if some of those not chosen for continued funding were to prove us wrong," he said.
The five chosen athletes, possibly accompanied by other self-funded athletes, will fly out tomorrow for further training at Lake Placid, New York, prior to an America’s Cup skeleton competition in that venue at the end of January.
Options for further competition will depend on results in Lake Placid but could include events in Germany and at Calgary in Canada.
