Olympian Michelle Steele has written a new chapter in Australian winter sports history by winning the country's first World Cup skeleton medal in Nagano overnight.

The Bundaberg 20-year-old was the fastest woman down the 1998 Olympic bobsleigh track in the opening run of the event, and although she slipped to third fastest on the second run, her combined time of one minute 54.51 seconds put her into the silver medal position.

United States slider Katie Uhlaender collected the gold medal, her fourth straight for the season, with a time of 1:54.23.

Bronze went to Courtney Yamada, also of the USA, in 1:54.59.

Steele's Australian Institute of Sport team-mate Melissa Hoar, competing for the first time this season, finished in seventh place in a time of 1:55.55, while the third member of the Australian team, Emma Lincoln-Smith, was in 14th position, 3.31 seconds behind the winner.

The result puts Steele into fourth place on the World Cup standings at the halfway mark of the season, and Australia into third place on the Nations' Cup list, ahead of Switzerland, Germany, Russia, Italy, Great Britain and Japan.

"I'm over the moon and really stoked with the result," Steele said. "It's the first World Cup medal for Australia which is pretty special and my first World Cup medal which is extremely special for me and for the team as well."

"It was a tough race and I've had a tough week here in training."

"Things have been a bit difficult sorting out runners and the track and snow and no snow and things like that, so we were playing around with a few things and it was good to pull it together on the day and get a good result."

"It was very, very exciting to win the first heat, because I have never come close to doing that before, beating Katie Uhlaender which was pretty awesome."

"It's back to training now for the rest of the World Cup and the World Championships in a couple of weeks, but it's really exciting and congratulations to (Olympic Winter Institute Skeleton Head Coach) Terry Holland and the rest of the girls and the team because we all pulled it together on the day."

Hoar's performance in coming seventh was also remarkable. The reigning World Junior Champion had missed the first half of the season in rehabilitation, and the Nagano event was her first time back on ice.

"I was really happy with my result," Hoar said, "coming back from injury, having hip surgery just over three months ago, and it was my first week back on the ice."

"I was having a bit of a tough week in training, getting my form back, but it was good to race again and get the feel of sliding again and I'm very pleased with the outcome of the race."

Uhlaender leads the individual World Cup standings on 400 points with team-mate Noelle Pikus-Pace in second position on 290 points. Swiss Olympic champion Maya Pedersen - absent from the Nagano event - is in third position on 260 points while Steele has 215 points.

The USA leads the Nations' Cup on 230 points, Canada is second on 215 and Australia holds third place with 164.

The medal performance is an emphatic endorsement of the Australian Institute of Sport Skeleton sports science project initiated in 2004, and the Olympic Winter Institute skeleton program that has continued the development of the sport in Australia since July 2006.

The next World Cup event is in Igls, Austria, on January 20.

OWI