Britain’s Winter Olympic and Paralympic athletes are to receive a record injection of cash of more than £33m from UK Sport over the four-year cycle leading to the next Games, Alpes 2030.
More than £25m was invested in the UK’s winter sport athletes across 11 different sports before the Milan-Cortina Games this February, which were hailed as Britain’s most successful.
The 15th-place finish in the medal table at Milan-Cortina was their best-ever at a Winter Games, while the five-medal total matched the record haul from Sochi 2014 and Pyeongchang 2018.
The three golds won – by Charlotte Bankes and Huw Nightingale in the mixed team snowboard cross, Matt Weston in the men’s skeleton and Weston and Tabby Stoecker in the mixed team skeleton – marked a breakthrough, with GB having never won more than one at a single Games.
While it was an excellent Games GB were also left with a feeling of what might have been, after several near-misses include defeat in the gold medal match for the men’s curling squad, two fourth-place finishes for freeskier Kirsty Muir, and another fourth place for former snowboarding world champion Mia Brookes.
A statement by UK Sport on Tuesday announcing the £8m increase on funding from the last cycle said: “Today’s announcement reflects UK Sport’s belief that whilst Milan Cortina marked an historic moment for British winter sport, the current British winter sport cohort have even more potential for Alpes 2030, which they must be supported to achieve if the UK is to cement its position as an ever-greater force in winter sport.
“The record investment, made possible thanks to sustained investment by The National Lottery and the UK Government, is accompanied by bold reform to the UK’s winter sport system to maximise performance success and protect public money. It is designed to support the UK’s next generation of winter Olympic and Paralympic athletes to achieve their potential at another Winter Games on European soil in 2030.”
The funding will be made available to the curling, wheelchair curling, skeleton, snowsport, bobsleigh and ice skating programmes.
£445,000 of the investment will be provided to the ice hockey programme in “transition funding”, which UK Sport said is the first investment of its kind and is designed to enable the sport to build a “more commercially sustainable performance model”.
Part of UK Sport’s plans for the next four-year Olympic and Paralympic cycle involve the creation of Sport Org, which it described as a “specialist, multi-sport performance delivery organisation” which will run performance programmes on behalf of some national governing bodies (NGBs).
The move is in line with thinking from several senior figures in high-performance sport within the UK that the various winter sports bodies must work more collaboratively.
UK Sport said: “By bringing more of the UK’s leading performance experts and resources together, Sport Org aims to provide greater stability for athletes, drive efficiencies in how money is spent, enable greater access to performance expertise and, ultimately, better support athletes to succeed on the world stage.”
Curling and wheelchair curling programmes are already provided by Sport Org, which will continue for the next cycle until Alpes 2030, while bobsleigh and skeleton will move from being operated by the British Bobsleigh and Skeleton Association (BBSA) for this cycle to Sport Org for the Utah 2034 cycle.
Just over £10m of the funding will go towards the bobsleigh and skeleton programmes, the latter of which in particular has seen a huge surge in interest for Talent ID days as a result of GB’s success on the sliding track.
Another £6.5m will be put towards curling and £1.9m to wheelchair curling, with £2m going towards the different ice skating disciplines – figure skating, short track, and speed skating.
A further £12.5m will be ringfenced for the UK’s snowsport athletes (skiing and snowboarding), although the manner of delivery is yet to be confirmed. Two of GB’s five medals at Milan-Cortina were won by snowsport athletes: Zoe Atkin took bronze in the women’s halfpipe while Bankes and Nightingale took gold in the mixed team snowboard cross.
UK Sport said it has “immense belief and confidence” in those athletes but would not provide that investment through the governing body, GB Snowsport, after the end of the Milan-Cortina cycle. It also announced it would commission an independent review into GB Snowsport’s governance.
UK Sport said: “We will therefore now engage constructively with GB Snowsport, to explore a number of options in determining an alternative delivery model for the £12.5 million investment we have ringfenced to support the UK’s snowsport athletes ahead of Alpes 2030.
“It is intended that the new delivery model will be confirmed as soon as possible this year to allow the funding to flow seamlessly into the Alpes 2030 cycle. This would allow snowsport athletes to be protected and to continue to benefit from public funding.”
UK Sport confirmed that it had informed all eligible snowsport athletes of the decision and written to reassure them of its commitment to their funding, and to ensuring they will continue to have access to “wider benefits” for funded athletes.
A GB Snowsport spokesperson said: “GB Snowsport is disappointed by UK Sport’s decision to propose an alternative investment route for snowsport funding for the 2030 Olympic and Paralympic cycle. We remain fully committed to supporting our athletes in their performance endeavours.
“We are hugely proud of everything that we have achieved over the past four years, not least the remarkable medal successes on the international stage culminating in Britain’s greatest ever Olympic Winter Games on snow in Milan-Cortina. Our athletes, staff, and sports have achieved incredible things on and off snow over recent years, and we firmly believe the system we have built together remains the most effective way to continue to support Britain’s snowsport athletes.
“We do remain committed to continuing to work with UK Sport on these matters in a constructive way. However, we reserve the right to keep all options open to ensure that the achievements of the past four years are not lost as we approach another European Games.
“We have recently concluded an independent governance review funded by UK Sport, which has confirmed that our governance standards remain strong and appropriate. We look forward to engaging fully and robustly in any new review, which we are confident will reach the same conclusions.”
