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First Maltese to compete at European Skeleton Championships
First Maltese to compete at European Skeleton Championships
Athlete Shannon Galea represented Malta in its very first European Championship appearance in Skeleton racing in St Moritz in Switzerland today.
The race in the Swiss town forms part of the World Cup series, which is organised by the International Bobsleigh Skeleton Federation, but it also serves as a European Championship competition. Shannon completed the course in St Moritz in an impressive time of one minute, 13.55 seconds. Her timing resulted in her finishing 24th out of 25 competitors. Only the first 20 participants proceeded to the next round, meaning that Galea did not progress any further in the competition.
“It’s an honour to be racing against some of the world’s best female athletes in this sport. It has been a lot of hard work to get to this point and preparation. I hope that this experience creates a new gateway for Maltese sports and to encourage more involvement in sport at all levels,” said Galea.
This is the first time that the Canadian-born athlete is representing Malta in a competition of this calibre and is also her last major event prior to the upcoming winter Olympics, set to take place in Beijing next month. Alongside snowboarder Jenise Spiteri and Elise Pellegrin, an Alpine skier, Galea is one of the three Matese athletes, vying to represent Malta at the Olympics.
Shannon Galea is being helped with her preparations by two former Canadian athletes, Michael Douglas and Elisabeth Maier, who also represented their own country in the winter Olympics. The former competed in the games in 2010 and the latter in 2018.
When asked how she felt about her performance, Galea said “I am happy with it given that I have only had six runs total, when compared to athletes who have been in this sport for over five years and several runs on this track. The start is the trickiest as you can lose a lot of time in the straights,” she said.
“I’m more than happy that I had a personal best in my push and cut four seconds off of my training runs heading into today’s race,” she added.
