It is not yet a close relationship, the one between skeleton star Kimberley Bos (28) and the track of the Yanqing National Sliding Center, in the mountains 90 kilometers outside Beijing. At first she grumbled about turn 13, it’s like going up against a wall there. She later said that Turns 4 and 16, the very last, require extra attention. In turn 2 you have to be careful right away. The sled slides so high that the roof comes frighteningly close.
It is in any case a route on which it is difficult to find a nice rhythm, although De Edese first drew the map and then imprinted it in her head: first an alternation of left and right, followed by a series only on the right and concluded with four turn left. “A little tricky, not very technical, a little weird,” was her description before she left for China.
This is the result after she completes two of the four runs on Friday; the decisive half will follow on Saturday. In the first heat she makes three mistakes and finishes tenth with a time of 1.02.51. Such a ranking is below the level of the winner of the World Cup last season.
But in the second descent she shows that she can really fathom the track. She is three tenths faster and moves up to sixth in the provisional standings, 0.39 seconds behind number one, the Australian Jaclyn Narracott. This keeps her view of the stage. The difference with the third in the ranking, the German Tina Hermann, is 16 hundredths. In second place, Hannah Neise has only a two-hundredth lead over her compatriot.
In front of the NOS camera, Bos explains that she had to adapt during the heats. According to her, because bobsleighers have also started using the track, the structure of the ice has changed. “You saw that nobody was perfect.” In the training sessions earlier this week the times had been slightly better, although she did not settle among the fastest.
She also sees her competitors struggling on Friday. Canadian Mirela Rahneva first clocked in at 1.02.03, good for first place, before falling far back to ninth place in the second run. ‘This is a job that hardly anyone knows well. It is important to learn from your mistakes.’ She finds it striking that the two Chinese participants ‘do not sled everyone home’. ‘They have already made so many runs here.’ Dan Zhao is fourth, Yuxi Li tenth.
Bos is satisfied with the result of the first day. ‘I have now been able to correct two of the three mistakes. I have made progress. And that’s the point.’