Weston in silver spot overnight
Matt Weston sits second overnight as he looks to retain his Men’s Skeleton World Championship title in Winterberg.
Weston, who became Great Britain’s first men’s World Champion for 15 years last season, is four hundredths of a second behind race leader and reigning Olympic Champion Christopher Grotheer with two of the four runs complete.
The gap from Weston to third spot is a massive 0.69 seconds as the top two ranked sliders in the world showed their class in deteriorating ice conditions in Germany.
Weston clocked a combined time of 1 minute 54.34 seconds, coming down second quickest in Run 1 in 56.79 seconds and then fifth fastest in Run 2 as conditions saw the ice become slower and slower over time.
If Weston secures a medal of any colour, he will become just the second Brit to win multiple World Championship medals after double Olympic Champion Lizzy Yarnold. Yarnold won gold in Winterberg in 2015 and bronze in Lake Placid in 2012 and Konigssee in 2017.
Fellow Brits Marcus Wyatt and Craig Thompson are sixth and eighth respectively, with Wyatt 14 hundredths of a second outside the medal spots and Thompson a further 12 hundredths back.
China’s Zheng Yin, who won the two most recent World Cup races in Altenberg and Sigulda and who is currently No4 in the world rankings, is in the bronze medal position, with last year’s World Championship silver medalist, Amedeo Bagnis of Italy, fourth overnight.
Axel Jungk is fifth and another German, Felix Keisinger, splits Wyatt and Thompson in the standings.
The race concludes tomorrow with Runs 3 and 4 beginning at 3pm GMT.
Tabby Stoecker is also in silver medal position for GB in the women’s race, with Amelia Coltman in eighth position, 0.18 seconds outside the medals.
The women’s event also finishes tomorrow from 11am GMT.
This year’s World Championships take place in Winterberg, Germany from February 22nd - March 3rd, with the schedule as follows:
Thurs 22 Feb
Women's Skeleton Heats 1&2 9am
Men's Skeleton Heats 1&2 1pm
Fri 23 Feb
Women's Skeleton Heats 3&4 11am
Men's Skeleton Heats 3&4 3pm
Sat 24 Feb
Women's Monobob Heats 1&2 8am
2-man Bobsleigh Heats 1&2 12pm
Skeleton Mixed Team Competition 4pm
Sun 25 Feb
Women's Monobob Heats 3&4 8.15am
2-man Bobsleigh Heats 3&4 12.15pm
Fri 1 Mar
Women's Bobsleigh Heats 1&2 2pm
Sat 2 Mar
4-man Bobsleigh Heats 1&2 9am
Women's Bobsleigh Heats 3&4 1.30pm
Sun 3 Mar
4-man Bobsleigh Heats 3&4 1pm
All races will be shown live on the IBSF YouTube channel and website
