Going downhill fast

Mark Woods talks to Ashleigh Nelson about making the switch from sprinting to bobsled in the pursuit of an elusive Olympic medal

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"I think I timed my message perfectly," says Adele Nicoll. Pretty much, Ashleigh Nelson signals in agreement. Twice a member of the women's 4x100m relay squad at Olympic Games, the 34-year-old from Stoke admits she had thrown everything at making it a hat-trick at Paris 2024 despite surgery that had sidelined her for the entirety of the previous season.

A few early summer outings were well shy of her best. Not making it out of the semifinals of the UK Championships was below par for someone with world, European and Commonwealth medals in the bank.

"Things just weren't quite clicking, just weren't going how I wanted them to," Nelson recounts. "And then Adele messaged me in the July and was like: 'Do you want to give bobsleigh a go?'"

It was not an alien idea after watching longtime colleague (and now television Gladiator) Montell Douglas make a similar leap and become the first British woman to compete at a Summer and Winter Games. But, Nelson admits: "I just thought: 'I'd never do that. When I'm done in athletics, I'm done completely'. But then I went down and I thought: 'This is fun'. And it challenged me.