Matt Weston storms to Olympic skeleton gold to give Team GB first medal of the Games
Matt Weston produced a near-perfect display on Cortina's winding sliding track to win Olympic skeleton gold, setting the track record on all four runs and delivering Team GB's first medal of the Games. The 28-year-old finished with an emphatic overall time of 3: 43. 33, leaving rivals chasing but unable to close the gap.
Masterclass on Cortina's ice
Weston tightened up the errors that troubled him earlier in the competition and then let the sled do the talking. He set a new track mark on each run and capped his campaign with a final, aggressive victory lap of 55. 61 seconds. That final push extended his lead and left Germany's Axel Jungk 0. 88 seconds adrift in silver, with compatriot Christopher Grotheer taking bronze 1. 07 seconds back.
Having dominated the sport across the last four-year cycle, Weston entered the Games as favourite, but no British man had ever won Olympic skeleton gold before. The pressure to deliver — from personal ambition, from a nation expecting medals, and from the shadow of a disappointing 2022 Games where Britain failed to reach the skeleton podium — was intense. Weston dealt with that weight with composure, describing the moment as everything he had worked toward: "It means everything. It means a hell of a lot to me personally, I've worked so hard for this, " he said. "I've sacrificed everything for this moment and it feels amazing. "
The victory adds an Olympic crown to a résumé that already includes two World Championship titles and three overall World Cup trophies. Four years ago Weston left the Games empty-handed in 15th place and came close to quitting the sport. Since then he has learned to embrace pressure, fine-tuned recovery and preparation, and even leaned on simple comforts — rest and plenty of pasta — to stay sharp on race day.
Team momentum and the hunt for more bling
Weston's success immediately gave Team GB fresh momentum. The win punctured a tense start to the Games for Britain and injected belief into the wider winter-sport squad. Within minutes of his victory, the nation's skeleton programme reported a surge of interest in its talent-identification drive, illustrating how one headline performance can inspire new recruits.
Weston has another chance to add to his gold: the mixed team skeleton, a new event at these Games. The format pairs a men's run with the fastest female finisher from the same country; the combined time decides the medals. Unlike the standard event, the mixed team uses a reaction-start system where athletes may only go when the start lights change and a half-second penalty is applied for a false start. Weston said the format adds jeopardy and adrenaline, and that Britain can be "one of the strongest sets of teams out there". He will be paired with the fastest of Britain's women — contenders include Tabby Stoecker, Freya Tarbit and Amelia Coltman — and the team will also include fellow male slider Marcus Wyatt.
Strong opposition is expected from China, Austria and Germany, nations with deep skeleton pedigrees. Weston has already beaten many of them on form this week in Cortina, but the reaction-start twist makes the mixed event unpredictable and exciting.
Long-term foundations behind British success
Britain's skeleton prominence is rooted in decades of technical innovation and targeted investment. The domestic programme has benefited from steady funding in recent cycles, channelled into coaching, facilities and athlete support. That infrastructure, plus a successful talent-identification pipeline that recruits athletes from other sports, helps explain how a country without an ice track can produce world-beating sliders.
Weston's triumph will be viewed as vindication of that approach: an athlete who switched from rugby and taekwondo to skeleton less than a decade ago has reached the very top. With the mixed team event still to come, Weston and Team GB now have the chance to turn a historic solitary gold into a multi-medal outing that could set the tone for the rest of the Games.
