As far as inspirational women go, Menna Fitzpatrick is right up there having this week landed herself the title of ParalympicsGB’s most decorated Winter Paralympian.
And if that isn’t enough, Menna is preparing to ski down the ice river piste in China with a peak gradient of 70% at 35 miles per hour on Friday.
She has secured herself two medals already at the current 2022 Winter Paralympics – a silver and a bronze on the slopes of Beijing’s Yanqing National Alpine Centre.
This Friday in the early hours UK time, she goes again in the visually impaired giant slalom.
As Britain’s most decorated Winter Paralympian already with six medals from this games and PyeongChang, she has good chances for another medal, as does teammate and competitor Mille Knight.
Menna Fitzpatrick is one of over 1,000 athletes who have benefited from National Lottery funding which allows them to train full-time, have access to the world’s best coaches and benefit from pioneering technology, science and medical support. This funding has been crucial in getting them to the start line of the Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games in Beijing 2022.
Her primary guide Katie Guest tested positive for covid just before she travelled to China and then one of the ski technicians caught it and she had to create a bond with RAF ski guide Corporal Gary Smith, very quickly.
Gary Smith said: “We've had a tough lead into the games but we just kept on doing everything we could to try and keep each other safe and luckily, we made it out here.”
Although Covid set the team back, Menna has one of the world’s greatest visual impaired skiers on her team as both a teammate and competitor.
Menna said: “We're quite lucky that that one of my competitions is with my teammate Millie Knight.
"We're always trying to see what each other are doing and trying to better ourselves. I think having a teammate that’s also a competitor makes you work harder for sure and do things like do an extra run when the other one has gone in.”
“I really couldn't do any of this without the support of The National Lottery and UK Sport. This is my full time job and the funding does allow me to train as a full time athlete and that's exactly what you need to be able to do to keep up with the rest of the girls in the field. We definitely couldn't do it without National Lottery players who do go and buy that ticket. We do want to thank everybody who does play and supports The National Lottery.”
Winter sports have high levels of jeopardy but for Menna who has only 5% vision, she has guide Gary Smith to get her down the mountain safely.
Menna said: “We've almost got to be like one unit together.
“It’s all about building trust. We'll go and do rock climbing or we'll go and do a high ropes course just to try and build up that trust in any way we possibly can and then it will be (building trust) on the snow and taking the time on the snow.
"Off the snow, Gary will read out the dinner options and tell me what looks good. It's all about that extra stuff as well, the soft skills that you need for helping a visually impaired skier.
"All that combines together and makes us a team that works really well together and then that transfers onto the snow and make us almost like one.”
Gary has an important role in the race: “We communicate over a bluetooth communication set so I can talk to Menna and she can talk back to me so in the build-up for the race I'll try and keep her calm.
"We will already have had an inspection so we'll have a race plan. The start referee will say go and then I'll count in, three two, one go. We'll ski out (of the start gates) and we'll be as close as we can and then all the way we'll be feeding back communication. I'll be telling her where we are in the course and what's coming up. I'll be checking Menna and looking over my shoulder all the way down. It's just a team effort.
“In the speed events, I'm trying to keep Menna nice and calm so I'll be telling her where she can tuck, where she needs to open up, when she needs to roll up on the skis. I'll be telling her to close the distance. I might be standing up a little bit to slow myself down. When the light changes that really affects Menna’s vision of how much she can see me as an orange blob in front of her, so I'll be telling her about the shaded sections coming up so she might lose me but don't panic, stay calm.”
Menna said: “I think that the tone in which he says things, especially in speed events, the way that he's dead calm just reassures me that there's nothing scary coming up or that we're just going to relax.
"We will take it as chilled as we can, as well as trying to race as fast as we can. Then in the tech races it's like, ’come go, go, go on’. It's quite a different tone and tempo for the tech races."
Gary said: “We're so lucky to have all of our coaches, our physios, our strength and conditioning and our ski technicians. Our ski technician will be up with us all day on the hill. He’ll come off the hill, he'll be in a wax cabin and he'll be there until 2am. He will be prepping forty sets of skis for this team.
"Every time we click into the skis, we don't even have to think about our skis. We've talked to him about each different snow condition. He knows before we even tell him anyway, and so every time we click into the skis we can be so confident that we're going to get grip, the skis are going to run fast.
“Without The National Lottery and everyone at home, we wouldn't have that sort of support. Previously, when I first joined the team, I'd be doing the skis, so me and Menna would come off the hill, I'd spend hours prepping skis. So now we can just get off the hill, recover and then just focus on our performance. So things like that make a massive difference to this team."
Menna Fitzpatrick races in the Giant Slalom between 0200 and 0315 UK time on Friday and then 0515 and 0630 the same day.
Menna said: “It will be absolutely amazing (to win another medal on Friday). To have won Silver and Bronze already is incredible. We'll just go out there and try our best.”
The Paralympic Games is a time to celebrate remarkable sporting achievement and challenge perceptions of the inspirational abilities of disabled people.
National Lottery players are one of the biggest supporters of ParalympicsGB winter athletes and raise more than £30 million each week for good causes, including grassroots and elite sport. If you want to learn more about how you can take part in disability sport, visit www.parasport.org.uk.
