TV Guide: Going downhill fast means Team GB’s Paralympians are up for gold

Expectations were not high for Britain’s visually impaired cross-country skiers at the first Winter Paralympics 50 years ago. They had been training on a plastic run in Aldershot with ancient kit and arrived in Örnsköldsvik, Sweden, to find that two of the three locals booked as their skiing guides didn’t speak English.

“It was wonderful but pretty bonkers,” Mike Brace told the World Service’s Sporting Witness in 2022, available on BBC Sounds.

Brace, who would compete in five Winter Paralympics, had been blind from the age of 10 after a fireworks accident. His 16-year-old guide had hesitant English and would unhelpfully say things like “perhaps you should go left”, just as his athlete went right. Brace skied into the barrier on his first run and came 26th. “It was a leap of faith,” he said. “But none of us finished last.”

Britain did not win a medal until the third Winter Games in Innsbruck in 1984, bringing home four silvers and six bronzes, still a record haul. All but two of them came in ice sledge speed racing, a sport that was discontinued after 1998. The first of Britain’s three Paralympic golds, all in alpine skiing for the visually impaired, was won by Kelly Gallagher in Sochi in 2014.

The torch was lit on Tuesday at Stoke Mandeville Hospital in Buckinghamshire, the birthplace of the Paralympics, and the opening ceremony will take place in the Roman arena in Verona on Friday (4seven, 6.30pm), though the action will have already started in Cortina with the wheelchair curling mixed doubles (GB v Estonia, Wednesday, Ch4 Sports YouTube, 6pm).

Britain’s 25-strong squad includes two former Paralympic ski champions in Menna Fitzpatrick, who has recovered from a bad knee injury three months ago, and Neil Simpson, who is guided by his brother Andrew (women’s downhill Saturday, 9.30am; men’s 10.50am).

Away from the slopes, today brings the 450th Old Firm derby, with Rangers just one win ahead of Celtic in the 138-year series (Sky Sports Main, noon). A draw would suit Hearts, who had a four-point lead in the Scottish Premiership before they played Aberdeen yesterday and are chasing their first title since 1960. It has been more than 40 seasons since the Scottish top flight was won by someone other than Rangers or Celtic.

England’s women begin their qualification for the 2027 football World Cup this week. Spain, who beat them in the 2023 final but lost in the final of Euro 2025, renew their rivalry at Wembley next month. First England face Ukraine in Turkey (Tuesday, ITV4, 5pm) and Iceland at Nottingham Forest’s City Ground (Saturday, ITV4, 12.30pm).

Photography by Harry Murphy/Getty Images