Olympics: NZ to review winter sports choices

1.30 pm

New Zealand's Olympic Committee (NZOC) will review which winter sports it should support in the wake of this month's Olympic Winter Games.

Secretary General Barry Maister said today some rationalisation may be needed about which sports New Zealand could realistically produce competitive and winning athletes in.

However, he defended the performances of New Zealand's 11 athletes at the Salt Lake City Games in the United States, which ended yesterday. It had definitely been worth sending a team, he said.

"Many of them didn't perform up to their own expectations, others did. Our competitors were a superb group of athletes who were giving it all against great odds."

Of the athletes at the Games, skiers Claudia Riegler, Todd Haywood and Jesse Teat, skeleton racer Liz Couch and the two-man bobsleigh team met selection expectations.

Luge racer Angela Paul and the four-man bobsleigh team, which crashed, did not.

Young short track speed skater Mark Jackson, 20, did not qualify for the second round in any of his three events, but his actual rankings from the Games are not yet available.

Little public money was spent on the team. Paul and Jackson were the only athletes to receive personal grants from the now defunct Sports Foundation, based on past world championship results.

Skier Claudia Riegler received a $47,000 package from the foundation, but that included funds raised through other sources.

Money from the International Olympic Committee's Solidarity Fund, $100,000 over two years, was directed to the athletes for training through the NZOC.

Athletes paid most of the costs out of their own pockets or through personal sponsorships.

In contrast, Germany's world champion bobsleigh racers spend millions of dollars each year on research alone.

Australian slalom skier and former Olympic bronze medallist Zali Steggall, who has comparable world rankings to Riegler, receives $A300,000 ($372,624) a year from the Australian Olympic Winter Institute's $A1.8 million annual budget.

Maister said on radio the athletes had spent a lot of their own time and money qualifying for the Games.

"They're denied access to funding. I take my hat off to them, they're amateur athletes competing in a professional world.

"I think it's an investment that isn't a waste of time."

A review of the Games would be conducted after the team and officials returned this week.

"I think we've got to sit down and rationalise where we're going to make the investment."

He said a focus may have to go on the sports where New Zealand had a chance of developing winners, in speed skating and snow sports.

He said it may not be practical to fund the sliding sports, such as luge, with no tracks available in the southern hemisphere.

Dunedin's Academy of Sport is already investigating establishing a winter sports institute, almost certainly in Queenstown or Wanaka.

Although planning is still at an early stage, academy head Kereyn Smith told NZPA last week New Zealand could make use of its environmental advantages to support winter sport athletes.

Australia's Institute was set up after the Japan Winter Olympics, four years ago, and is publicly and privately funded.

Two Australian athletes won gold medals this year.

- NZPA