Visually-impaired skier Millie Knight admits it would be “extremely emotional” to complete her Paralympic medal collection with gold in Beijing but is keen to curb expectation.
Knight, who won two silvers and a bronze in PyeongChang in 2018, was on Tuesday selected for her third successive Games after fearing repeated concussions may end her career.
The 23-year-old underlined her mental resilience in January by becoming super combined world champion in Lillehammer, Norway, in addition to taking bronze in the super-G event.
While she has taken confidence from those successes, Kent-born Knight accepts she faces a tough task next month when she goes for glory in each of the five Paralympic alpine events alongside guide Brett Wild.
“Obviously to complete the set would be extremely emotional,” she told the PA news agency. “We have every title at the moment, except for Paralympic champions.
“I don’t believe that this is something that we will achieve in these Games – the standard of the field has increased 10-fold and there are some incredibly talented girls out there.
“I made the conscious decision a couple of months ago to take the pressure off myself by not aiming for a medal target and that’s actually released a lot of space in my mind to actually focus on things that I can control and that are important, like my fitness and my strength.
There was a lot of time when I actually thought I wasn't going to get better and I wasn't ever going to get my skis back on because I just thought, 'I think this fear is going to rule me', and, well, I didn't let it.
“I’m in a much better position now than I would be if I hadn’t won those (World Championship) medals and I’m very grateful that we did win them. It has given us a little bit of confidence but not too much that it’s going to distract us from the reality.”
Knight was chosen as Great Britain’s flagbearer on her Games debut aged 15 at Sochi in 2014, before bringing home a trio of medals from South Korea four years later.
Selection for China comes just 12 months on since she had serious doubts about returning to the slopes amid the punishing recovery from the fourth traumatic head injury of her life, suffered during a training crash in Austria.
“To be going through concussion again, for the fourth time, was heartbreaking and it was so demoralising mentally because the recovery was slow,” she said.
“It was painful, nothing was happening very fast and I knew that all the girls I am competing against were out training and I’m still stuck in my bed really not functioning well as a human, never mind as a world champion or a Paralympic medallist.
“It was so frustrating and there was a lot of time when I actually thought I wasn’t going to get better and I wasn’t ever going to get my skis back on because I just thought, ‘I think this fear is going to rule me’, and, well, I didn’t let it.”
Knight, from Canterbury, lost the majority of her sight due to two separate eye infections in early childhood and took up skiing not long after, aged six.
She and Scotsman Wild – a submariner in the Royal Navy – became Britain’s first world champions in a snow sport in 2017 when they triumphed in the downhill event in Tarvisio, Italy.
I was rubbish at sports when I was younger, like really bad, and I still gave everything a go.
They backed that up with second-placed finishes in downhill and super-G at the Paralympics the following year, in addition to third in the slalom, prior to claiming a second world title just last month.
The pair have been together for six years and race untethered, communicating via Bluetooth headsets in their helmets as they hurtle down mountains at speeds of around 70 miles per hour.
Despite the obvious dangers, Knight – a psychology student at Kent University – says skiing provides a perfect antidote to the restrictive nature of everyday living.
“I was rubbish at sports when I was younger, like really bad, and I still gave everything a go,” she said.
“When I was at school there were sports like hockey and netball and rounders, things like that, and I couldn’t see the ball at all. In cross country, I kept running over trees and it was so bad.
“Then I took up rowing and everybody is going backwards, nobody can really see where they are going, so you’re all in the same boat.
“That was kind of the turning point in the world of sport for me, I was like, ‘oh, there are actually sports I can do’.
“But skiing is very unique. Life is fairly slow and restrictive in my day-to-day life: I can’t drive a car and I have to rely on a lot of other people to take me places and to do things.
“Whereas skiing, I’m in control, I’m the one that can go really fast and it’s pretty awesome.”
