A relatively new Winter Olympic sport - having first gained Olympic status at the Salt Lake City games in 2002 - Skeleton is a fast winter sliding sport in which you ride a small sled down a frozen track while lying face down and face first - the notable difference between luge which requires you to lie on you back- feet first. This week marked the opening of the Sliding center to the public who, for a fee of $150, can experience the sport of Skeleton on an official Olympic Sliding track. (Luge is too dangerous a sport to be open to the general public - possibly deemed so after Georgian Olympic luger Nodar Kumaritashvili crashed and died on the Whistler track in a pre-olympic training run)
After a informative albeit humourous briefing session, where helmets were fitted, liabilities were signed and the riding technique of skeleton was clearly outlined to us, we took the track not too sure what to expect.
What transpired was 30 seconds of absolute adrenalin-fueled speed that can only really be compared to riding a roller coaster. That said, with your face only inches away from the ice and with no way of controlling your ever-increasing speed, it really is unlike anything ever experienced before.
Needless the say, by the time you reach the final corner, you're reaching speeds of just under R100km's per hour -a truly remarkable acceleration from a standing start only 30 seconds previously.
Thanks to Meg for including us in this surreal and uniquely unforgettable experience.
Final race stat's and results as follows below: (Note top speed for Andy and I as 97.7 and 98.9 km's/hour respectively)
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| Andy - 2'nd Run |
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| Brendon - 1'st Run |
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| Sequence: Brendon - 1'st Run |
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| Black and White Sequence: Brendon - 2'nd Run |
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