Winter Olympics<\/a> before announcing his retirement. \u201cI said I would ski race until my legs fall off and I think they pretty much have,\u201d he said.<\/p>\nRyding\u2019s 17th-placed finish in the men\u2019s slalom in Bormio was not quite the swansong the 39-year-old had intended. But sometimes legacy matters as much as medals. He leaves the slopes as undoubtedly Britain\u2019s greatest skier, after an unlikely journey that started by dodging sheep on a 50m dry-ski slope in Pendle, Lancashire.<\/p>\n
Britain\u2019s Dave Ryding finished in 17th place in the men\u2019s slalom. Photograph: Tom Jenkins\/The Guardian<\/p>\n
\u201cI did it a totally different way and you probably say it was a one in a million shot,\u201d he said. \u201cBut I proved that you can do it.\u201d<\/p>\n
UK Sport may think differently, but not all Winter Olympic events are created equal. In some sports, having a technical advantage gives a competitor one hand on a medal before they even start; while in others, such as slalom skiing, the heritage and depth of competition matters. So when Ryding became the only Briton to win a World Cup skiing event, in Kitzb\u00fchel four years ago, it really cut through.<\/p>\n
\u201cFive-time Olympian, World Cup winner \u2013 I really can\u2019t ask for much more,\u201d he said. \u201cThe icing on the cake would have been to pull something out today. I just didn\u2019t quite have it to be honest. But I will never look back thinking: \u2018Did I stop too soon?\u2019 I gave it my all until the last gate.\u201d<\/p>\n
As Ryding watched, Lo\u00efc Meillard became Switzerland\u2019s first men\u2019s Olympic slalom champion since 1948 after the first-run leader, Atle Lie McGrath, straddled a gate in his second run.<\/p>\n
And while skiing has a reputation in Britain for being a posh sport, Ryding is anything but. His dad was a market trader, his mother a hairdresser.<\/p>\n
When he started at the age of six, sometimes the sheep would run across him while he was training. On other occasions they would leave excrement that would cause him to slip.<\/p>\n
He had to struggle to make his fifth Olympics too. In 2022, UK Sport completely cut skiing\u2019s funding; while it then relented and gave Ryding \u00a380,000 a year, he decided it would be better spent helping his teammates, including Billy Major, who finished 16th, travel to events.<\/p>\n
While he is retiring, Ryding says he wants to bring through the next wave of British skiers and help them become World Cup winners.<\/p>\n
\u201cI would put a bit of money on it saying that it is possible,\u201d he said. \u201cWe have Youth Olympic and world junior championship medals so the next generation is amazing. I really hope UK Sport sees that and get behind them.\u201d<\/p>\n
Ryding has already set his sights on a new target: lowering his parkrun personal best of 16min 54sec. \u201cFor sure, I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll get a dad bod too soon,\u201d he said, smiling as he waved a final goodbye.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere, the British men\u2019s and women\u2019s curlers are in danger of missing out on the semi-finals after losing on Monday. Team GB\u2019s men lost 7-6 against Norway, while the women were downed 6-10 by Switzerland.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"This time, Kirsty Muir must surely have believed that a Winter Olympic medal was in her grasp. But…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":429760,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[49,50,51,47,52,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-429759","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-headlines","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-news","11":"tag-top-stories","12":"tag-topnews","13":"tag-topstories"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429759","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=429759"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/429759\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/429760"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=429759"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=429759"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=429759"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}