02-14-2026, 03:50 PM
(02-14-2026, 11:17 AM)Old Fart Wrote:(02-14-2026, 08:32 AM)HeggebøsBarnDoor Wrote: I just don't understand how you get into that as a sport. Well unless you're holding a dinner tray whilst fooling around with a mate, who then pushes you down the slope and you somehow find out you're good at avoiding death.
he says that he was a Taekwondo champion but had a bad injury which stopped him competing.
He saw an open day advertised inviting anyone to come and be assessed for a suitable sport. They then send the results away and your particular profile of strength, size, sprinting speed, weight etc is matched against a list of specific requirements to excel at a particular sport.
The results came back that he was ideally suited to bombing down an ice shute at 90 mph on a tea tray so he joined the UK team to train specifically for that, and the rest is history.
He was also a very good rugby union player and a self-confessed adrenalin junkie. I have to say the training regime shown on BBC yesterday was gruelling. A lot of very heavy weight lifting particularly squats which is why all competitors have Jo Brand sized thighs ( that's illustrative rather than a confirmed fact).
Interesting. If someone said to me you look like you'd be good at going down the ice at 90mph i think i'd say no thank you and wonder quite how I'd managed to piss them off.