PA Sport is following Great Britain downhill skier Roger Cruickshank throughout his build-up to next month's Winter Olympics in Turin.In his own weekly column RAF flying officer Cruickshank will reveal the highs and lows of life on the World Cup circuit as he seeks to fulfil one of his lifetime ambitions.
The moment of truth has finally arrived as I head for the Europa Cup in Sella Nevea with my Olympic dream within touching distance.
I have two downhills and two super-gs ahead over the next four days, and I know if I finish in the top 20 in any of them I will qualify automatically for Turin.
My second training run today (Tuesday) augured well as I finished 10th fastest despite making a massive mistake in the lower section. It is crazy but I just seem to be skiing so much faster all the time now.
I might have other options but the bottom line is if I get top 20 here I seal the deal so that is my plan and I proved today that I do not need to think about anything else.
I had another encouraging week with fourth and seventh place finishes in two FIS races in Austria which points-wise represented the third and fourth best finishes of my career.
Not only that but I have tied up a sponsorship deal with Hydrostab, an Aberdeenshire oil company, to put their logo on my helmet.
Their interest vindicates the way I am skiing and the potential I have so it is a huge boost for me. It is also great to see a local company showing an interest in the athletes in their area.
So many athletes in so many sports are struggling for funding at the moment, and if I can show how much Hydrostab are helping me, then hopefully other companies will come forward too.
Also this week the British team got a big lift from Finlay Mickel's 10th place in the World Cup downhill in Wengen, which represented Britain's best finish since Martin Bell 18 years ago.
It is huge motivation because as a team we tend to bounce off each other's results. I was recently training with Finlay and beating him on splits and there was often a hundredth of a second between us.
So for him to ski like that gives me so much confidence, it shows I must be skiing really fast as well, and that if he can do it surely if I was in the right position I could do it as well.
Finlay is now in a very strong position because limits on the number of representatives per country means the Olympic field is not as competitive as the normal World Cup.
Meanwhile, Chemmy Alcott came a fantastic 12th in a super-g in Bad Kleinkirchheim so it is encouraging all round and gives me just the boost I need heading into the most important week of my career.
E-mail Article 
Print-Friendly
Subscribe to RSS Feed 
Post to del.icio.us
Facebook
