World title bid over for Shelley (From The Wiltshire Gazette and Herald)

World title bid over for Shelley

2:43pm Friday 26th January 2007 in Sport By Stuart White

SHELLEY Rudman finished tenth at the Skeleton World Championships.

The Pewsey slider, 25, produced her two best runs this afternoon but could not move up from tenth, where she started today after yesterday's opening session.

Rudman finished strongly with her best time of 1 minute 11.36 seconds, seventh fastest on the final run out of the 23 competitors at St Moritz, Switzerland.

Previously, she had clocked 1:11.69 and yesterday she completed her first run in 1:12.35 for ninth place before dropping down to tenth after run two (1:12.52).

Fellow British slider Amy Williams finished three places and 0.76 seconds ahead of the Olympic silver medallist after the four slide times were added together.

World champion is American ace Noelle Pikus-Pace, with Olympic champion Maya Pederson (Switzerland) in second and Katie Uhlaender (USA) third.

Former Swindon Harrier Rudman was just under four seconds off gold and two seconds off a medal.

Rudman had been training in Austria for round five of the Skeleton World Cup, where she also finished 10th, before the World Championships after deciding not to travel to Japan for the fourth round.

The Olympic silver medallist admits this season has been draining, and was hoping the decision to stay in Europe would benefit her at the biggest competition since Turin.

She added: "I have just finished a hard training block in the UK which went really well. I'm still training through the winter which is very tiring as this is the first year I am continuing while away sliding.

"All in all the big goal is for me to now try and connect with the track while sliding.

"The fact I know I'm not sliding at my best, pushing at my best, actually in the best physical condition I can be in and still be in the mix in races is positive. When it all clicks I should be challenging."

Rudman finished tenth in the third round of the elite skeleton competition at Park City, her season's best after 16th in Calgary and 12th at Lake Placid.