About MeHi, my name is Marcus Wyatt and I am a 28 year old Great British skeleton athlete originally from Honiton, Devon, now living in Bristol. I am a alumni of Swansea University where I studied for three years before graduating in the summer of 2014 with a degree in Psychology.
I spent my childhood growing up in Devon, playing football, skateboarding and doing any other sports I enjoyed. As I got older I continued to play football for my local team - Seaton Town FC making it into the mens 1st team whilst dabbling in a bit of sprinting and jumping for my school, making it to the South West schools champs in the Long Jump. At university I took up the opportunity to finally play American Football. I went on to become the Titans treasurer in my final year with as well as winning the National Challenge Trophy the same year. It was at this point in my final year at uni the chance to try Skeleton came up and I jumped at the opportunity to try it and possibly complete a dream of mine - to represent my country. However, the dream now is not simply to represent my country, it is to win gold in the 2022 Beijing Winter Olympic Games. Although this is a long way down the line, I believe I have the dedication and determination to do what it takes to bring home the gold! |
What is Skeleton? |
Skeleton is a sport where you slide head first down icy tracks at speeds of upto 140 kph, on a sled with no brakes. It is a sport on intricate detail where every one thousandth of a second counts. Skeleton athletes need to be able to sprint like a 100m sprinter, be as calm as a surgeon and drive like an F1 driver all whilst they are inches from icy walls in a lycra suit and their chin is scraping along the floor under 5G of pressure. You can see the history of the sport up until 2014 in the video opposite!
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How did I get into Skeleton? |
This is easily the question I get asked the most and it is a valid one given the slight obscurity of the sport and the lack of a track etc in the UK. It starts when I was in my final year of university and watching the Sochi Winter Olympic Games on my TV and seeing Lizzy Yarnold win gold in the skeleton for GB. This was after the previous gold won at the 2010 Vancouver Winter Olympics by Amy Williams. After Lizzy won gold they advertised about a talent identification scheme called Power2Podium where athletes with a background in sports that may translate well to the push start in skeleton should apply. Having come from Football, Athletics and American Football and also always being a a bit of an adrenaline junkie meant I applied as soon as possible.
Over 1000 people applied and this numbered kept getting reduced at various different trials throughout the next six months or so. For the final selection phase ten guys and ten girls got the chance to slide in Lillehammer for the first time and to prove they should be one of the ones selected. I managed to make it through this final phases and was selected onto the programme on the 23rd December 2014 and this is what led me to where I am today. |