Wales’ Adele Nicoll Helps Team GB to Historic Bobsleigh Silver Medal As She Looks Ahead to Beijing Games.

Team GB stormed to a silver medal in the women’s bobsleigh, thanks to the efforts of Nica McNeill and Wales’ very own Adele Nicoll in Latvia.

Incredibly, the occasion marked Adele’s second ever appearance at a World Cup bobsleigh event, having previously dedicated her life to shotput and discus events as a former Welsh Shotput Champion and British Indoor Championships Shotput Bronze Medallist.

When I spoke to Adele, her elation, surprise and modesty were clear to see.

“It was pretty surreal to begin with because we went in with no expectations to make the podium. Our mark to qualify for the Winter Olympics is to get within the top 66.6% in the field and we would have been happy for any result within that, so to come second place was pretty amazing.”

It marked the first time in 13 years since Team GB had received a medal in the women’s bobsleigh, and the first time in history that both the men and women’s teams had both made the podium.

Her transition into bobsleigh from track and field events is nothing short of remarkable, too.

“During the summer of 2020 at the end of lockdown one, I posted a video of me running in Victoria Gardens which Nica McNeill saw by chance on her Instagram Explore page. She messaged me telling me ‘You look super powerful, have you ever considered bobsleigh?’. Before that point I didn’t know anything about bobsleigh and four weeks later I was doing my trials for Team GB!”

Adele noted how, despite shotput and bobsleigh hardly sharing similarities, her previous experience as an athlete helped her transition into the sport, saying: “competing in shotput definitely helped me when it came to transitioning into bobsleigh because as an athlete you come through a lot of adversity. I’ve had to learn how to lose in order to get back up and understand what it takes to achieve things”.

The performance puts her in an excellent position to be picked by Nica McNeill as brakewoman for the Beijing games should they qualify, with a number of athletes also gunning for the same spot. Whilst Adele is embracing the challenge and eyeing up the Winter Olympics, her feet are still firmly on the ground.

“There’s never a guarantee of being picked to be selected, so there is a lot of pressure on me to perform. I want to take each race as an opportunity to build up a case for myself to be picked by putting in good performances. My goal is to help Team GB qualify whilst doing so and, hopefully, be the person behind Nica pushing that sled in Beijing.”

Team GB’s hopes of qualifying come down to the last race in St Moritz, where they need to finish in the 66.6% bracket in order to make it to Beijing.