Winter Olympics 2010 Funding Package

UK Sport has revealed a £6m package for the cycle up to the next Winter Olympics in Vancouver, Canada, in 2010. This is an overall 20% increase for winter sports, with bob skeleton and curling, which have been Britain's most successful events at the last two Olympics, receiving the bulk of the cash.

However the alpine skiing and snowboarding budget up until the 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver has been reduced by almost 50% from £1.72m to £922,000.

As well as cutting the overall budget, Slalom skiers Alain and Noel Baxter will no longer receive Talented Athlete Scholarship Scheme (TASS) individual sponsorship cash because their World Cup and Olympic results were not good enough. Only downhill skiers Finlay Mickel and Chemmy Alcott and snowboarder Zoe Gillings will receive this.

Cockburn, Snowsport GB's chief executive, said “It will be youngsters who are targeting the 2014 and 2018 Games who will see their programmes cut. This means we will have to try and get more commercial income to keep British skiing performing at the highest level."



At 24, Noel Baxter will get his funding cut
before he reaches his prime




Read about the funding package at http://www.uksport.gov.uk/template.asp?id=2382