Overview

Team Mouat remain undefeated at the European Curling championships having notched up wins against Switzerland, Norway, Netherlands and against an English team skipped by Moaut's brother. They should be able to extend that to 5 wins later today when they take on . Their first big challenge will come tomorrow when they take on . Team Morrison continues to frustrate with 2 wins and 3 losses to sit equal 5th overall. So far they've only managed to beat and but have lost to , and . They should be able to notch up a couple of wins in their matches as they'll face and before they finish up against and . Realistically, the best they can hope for is to finish with 5-4 record.

And a second Ice Dance Gold of the season for Fear & Gibson in the Finnish Grand Prix. They are going to be getting the big treatment from the BBC going into 2026, that's for sure.

Silver & bronze again for Wyatt & Weston so good points.

If you has said at the beginning of last season that all 3 of the new girls would win a world cup I would have looked at you in shock. I don't think the qualification for 2026 has started yet but surely we must be contenders for a full skeleton squad alongside the Germans.

Unlike yesterday's huge dollop of luck for Amelia Coltman, a big dominating win for Freya Tarbit!

After gold for the women in Pyeongchang, the guys follow it up with bronze for Matt Weston and silver for Marcus Wyatt. All-in-all, a pretty good day's work for the GB Skeleton team.

Tem GB's strong start to the winter sport season continues with Amelia Coltman taking gold in the opening race of the Skeleton World Cup in Pyeongchang with team-mate Freya Tarbit missing out on the podium by 0.02 seconds.

https://www.britishswimming.org/news/latest-swimming-news/olympic-medallists-and-senior-debutants-combine-for-world-short-course-champs/ Team for Short Course Worlds in December.

A bit late, but the GB women's team had a couple of matches in their qualifying campaign for the 2025 Women's EuroBasket tournament. They recorded a fairly comfortable win against 75-62 before suffering a frustrating defeat against . In an extremely tight game GB led by a point after the 1st quarter. They extended their lead to 5 points at half time and although they were pegged back, they went into the final quarter with a 2 point lead. Unfortunately, they lost the final quarter and ultimately fell to a 63-60 defeat. GB currently sit 2nd in their qualification group so they aren't automatically guaranteed to qualify for the next stage however they are one of the strongest 2nd placed teams and their last 2 group matches in February next year, are against teams that they have comfortably beaten already.

Unfortunately, it came too late for Paris, but the Bello brothers won the Elite 16 event in Rio this weekend. I could be wrong, but I think that is there first tournament win at the Elite16 level and with it, they have broken into the world's top 20. This should set them up to have a great start to 2025 gaining them direct entry to the Elite 16 level events without having to go through qualifying.

Reeves clearly spent too much time watching Keely etc and not enough time watching hockey and other relative disappointments.

Contrary to predictions........

It's quiet around here Funding for the next cycle has been announced and, in a pleasant surprise to me, there's been a 10% uplift. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/olympics/articles/cy87xr28jj7o

Bit of very bad news for British Cycling fans - ITV loses rights to the Tour de France after next year. OK, most hardcore fans won't affected, but there was definitely a "Wimbeldon" one event a year fanbase. ITV always tied in various other events like the BRitish Champs as well, so it's a loss. https://www.broadcastnow.co.uk/broadcasting/wbd-ties-up-exclusive-tour-de-france-rights/5198514.article#:~:text=Warner Bros. Discovery will become,races and highlights on ITV4.

Got our first Gold Medal of the season - Lilah Fear and Lewis Gibson winning the Free Dance at Skate America last weekend. Fear/Gibson (GBR) clinch Ice Dance gold at Skate America - International Skating Union (isu.org)

It's terribly sad and, at the same time, his attitude is inspiring. Fingers crossed he gets as much time as possible.

Sir Chris.

Always a big day - it's the naming of the fortunate individuals who going to be getting Olympic Funding for the next season. 2024/25 OLYMPIC WORLD CLASS PROGRAMME ATHLETES ANNOUNCED | British Athletics Here's the main winners and losers, shamelessly cut and pasted from a post in the Athletics Weekly Forums. Some of the names dropped are effectively retired anyway, or have already moved to other aspects of the sport like Eiliish McColgan with Road Racing. Others might be preparing appeals.... 19 were dropped from funding Dropped from Olympic Podium (1): Holly Bradshaw Dropped from Olympic Podium Potential (10): Elizabeth Bird, Tom Gale, Elliot Giles, Jake Heyward, Jessie Knight, Eilish McColgan, Lawrence Okoye, Charlotte Purdue, Daniel Rowden, Callum Wilkinson Dropped from Olympic Relays (2): Jodie Williams, Adam Gemili Dropped from Olympic Confirmation Level (Relays) (2): Alyson Bell, Aleeya Sibbons Dropped from Olympic Confirmation Level (4): Ellie Baker, Matthew Stonier, Lucy Hadaway, Samantha Harrison 17 were added to funding Added to Olympic Podium (2): Georgia Bell, Jacob Fincham-Dukes Added to Olympic Relays (7): Toby Harries, Desiree Henrry, Louie Hinchliffe, Amy Hunt, Hannah Kelly, Lina Nielsen, Sam Reardon Added to Olympic Confirmation Level (8): Alastair Chalmers, Phoebe Gill, Romell Glave, Megan Keith, Mahamed Mahamed, Jake Norris, Calli Haugher-Thackery, Revee Walcott-Nolan 5 were moved within tiers Max Burgin (from Olympic Confirmation Level to Olympic Podium) Charlie Dobson (from Olympic Relays to Olympic Podium Potential) Amber Anning (from Olympic Confirmation Level Relay to Olympic Podium) Emile Cairess (from Olympic Confirmation Level to Olympic Podium) Tade Ojora (from Olympic Confirmation Level to Olympic Podium Potential) 43 remained at their level Olympic Podium (16): Dina Asher-Smith, Keely Hodgkinson, Katarina Johnson-Thompson, Josh Kerr, Laura Muir, Jemma Reekie, Jazmin Sawyers, Jake Wightman, Matthew Hudson-Smith, Daryll Neita, Cindy Sember, Morgan Lake, Molly Caudery, Katie Snowden, Zharnel Hughes, Ben Pattison Olympic Podium Potential (9): Naomi Metzger, Aimee Pratt, Marc Scott, Jade O’Dowda, Melissa Courtney-Bryant, Neil Gourley, George Mills, Anna Purchase, Jessica Warner-Judd Olympic Confirmation Level (2): Charlotte Payne, Joshua Zeller Olympic Confirmation Level Relay (1): Yemi Mary John Olympic Relays (15): Imani-Lara Lansiquot, Nethaneel Mitchell-Blake, Laviai Nielsen, Asha Philip, Ama Pipi, Nicole Yeargin, Jona Efoloko, Victoria Ohuruogu, Jeremiah Azu, Eugene Amo-Dadzie, Joe Brier, Lewis Davey, Alex Haydock-Wilson, Bianca Williams, Rio Mitcham

GB team for 2024 UCI Track Cycling world Championships Based on provisional UCI entry list (individual events only) Men's Sprint Hayden Norris - Sprint, Keirin, Kilo Joe Truman - Sprint, Keirin, Kilo Harry Ledingham-Horn - Sprint, Keirin Alistair Fielding Marcus Hiley Men's Endurance Will Tidball - Elimination (R) Noah Hobbs - Elimination, Scratch (R), Omnium (R) Josh Charlton - Individual Pursuit Dan Bigham - Individual Pursuit Charlie Tanfield - Individual Pursuit Josh Tarling - Scratch, Madison Mark Stewart - Points Race, Madison Will Perret - Points Race (R) Ethan Hayter - Omnium Ollie Wood - Madison (R) Ethan Vernon Rhys Britton Michael Gill Women's Sprint Sophie Capewell - Sprint, Keirin (R), 500m TT Emma Finucane - Sprint, Keirin, 500m TT (R) Lowri Thomas - Sprint (R), 500m TT Katie Marchant - Sprint, Keirin, 500m TT Women's Endurance Jess Roberts - Elimination, Individual Pursuit (R), Omnium Katie Archibald - Elimination (R), Madison Josie Knight - Individual Pursuit Anna Morris - Individual Pursuit Megan Barker - Individual Pursuit Neah Evans - Scratch, Points Race, Omnium (R), Madison Sophie Lewis - Scratch (R) Madeline Leech - Points Race (R) Elinor Barker - Madison (R)

Two big wins today for young British cyclists. 20-year old Max Poole won the big mountain stage in the Tour of Langkawi. Might put him in with a chance of the overall, but lots of sprint stages to come. 18 year old Cat Ferguson - after double gold in the World Juniors last week - got her biggest and most prestigious win in the Belgian cobbled climb at Binche-Chimay-Binche. Both on Discovery Plus if you want to catch up.

Olympic athletes back in action this weekend at the Boulder World Cup event in Prague. On the men's side, Olympic Champion Toby Roberts qualified for the semifinal in 3rd place. He topped 4 of the 5 boulders - including 2 flash runs - but failed to score on the final route. Max Milne had the same result - 4 tops with 2 flashes - but he needed more attempts overall so qualifies in 9th place but is safely through to the semifinal. Dayan Akhtar was also competing and achieved 47th place finish with 1 top/2zones. For the women's competition, Erin McNiece's great form continues as she was the top qualifier - topping all 5 boulder routes including 3 in flash efforts. Lucy Garlick finished in 43rd place with 1 top.

BBC will have lots of coverage of the World Road Championships, both Para & Standard. And even on pukka BBC2. https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/cycling/articles/c8xejdly5z4o

Thanks a million for doing my job for me during the Paras Now, this time, for real, I need a snooze.

Athletics is always the easiest & cheapest sport for new nations to start a para program, so it will always be the most competitive. But certainly UKA seems a bit complacent when it comes to recruiting new talent compared to swimming or cycling for sure.

Lots of good stats here. Paris 2024 Paralympics: Best stats as GB win medals in 18 out of 19 sports - BBC Sport